Australian kids’ label Oobi ups sourcing from India

Alexandra Riggs’ Australian children’s clothing label Oobi, first started sourcing for products from factories in China, but as prices went

up, the company has turned to India. The lure is because better pricing and the product. Oobi’s export markets contribute about 20 percent of its sales of about 50,000 items a year. The company is witnessing a growth in export orders after being hit by the global financial crisis. Now it has added markets like Britain, Malaysia and Singapore in addition to New Zealand and Japan.

The label, that kicked off its business with small orders and bibs and bloomers, now focuses on garments for young girls aged from nine months to six years and now offers bright coloured, frilly dresses costing about 70 Australian dollars (over Rs 3,900).

First sourcing from the Qingdao company, as the product offerings extended, the company moved sourcing to a more sophisticated factory in Humen, in Guangdong province’s Pearl River Delta. But quick price rise in China as well as Vietnam led Oobi to source from New Delhi. The company prefers the prices and more handmade look as well as cotton products, which constitute a lot of its range of dresses for little girls manufactured by companies in the country. Oobi now sources 60 to 70 percent of its products from India while it’s keen to do more, long shipment times of six weeks compared with China’s two weeks forces them to rely upon the latter.