Lycra Rendezvous: Focus on India-centric innovations

The third edition of Lycra Rendezvous wrapped up in Mumbai recently. The two day event saw numerous sessions on the usage of Lycra in different applications. Presentations revolved around how Lycra fibers make good business sense

when used in different types of garments, and shaping garments with Lycra Beauty fabrics, innerwear with Lycra Freef!t and Lycra Inti!mate et al.

Elaborating on the ‘Lycra Rendezvous concept’, Avinash Chandra, Marketing Head, Invista-South Asia said, “We are taking Lycra Rendezvous to different cities. India has a large value chain and there are a large number of brands, manufacturers, distributors and mills. The idea of the fair is to bring everyone under one roof and start a dialogue with them so they can work with each other. We want to enable the industry to provide innovations to the consumer, the right garments with the right value additions.”

Scoring with India centric products

“We are doing well in India and our business is growing rapidly. We have a large number of customers and a warehouse in Chennai allows us to supply any amount of Lycra fibers. We did a lot of research in India before launching these platforms,” explains Chandra commenting.

The company has introduced several products like Lycra Beauty, Lycra Free Fit and Thermo Lite in India. Sighting demand for shapewear garments among Indian women, many brands are showing interest in Lycra Beauty fabric. “We are helping Indian brands develop such garments. We are also reaching out to mills. There are some mills which have developed Lycra Beauty fabric in cotton, so Indian women will be able to wear shapewear made out of cotton. So hopefully in a year there will be several brands doing cotton based shapewear with Lycra Beauty fabric in India,” affirms Chandra.

Lycra Free Fit fabric that is comfortable and maintains its shape even after several washes unlike 100 percent cotton underwear preferred by Indian consumers. Lycra Free Fit fabric contains five percent Lycra and 95 percent cotton, so fabric’s softness is retained. Thermo Lite fabrics help in keeping one’s body warm during chilly winters. It provides thermal resistance with lower fabric GSM.

The company is working on women’s leggings and churidars and men’s denim. Its innovation Toughmax Lycra fabric allows a wearer to do everything on denim like cuts, chlorine bleach and wrinkles. Soon it would also be launching a concept which will allow mills to produce stretch fabric which can be stitched by a tailor.

Betting big on India, HB LEE, Regional Business Director- Specialties Apparel, Asia Pacific says, “Our strategy for India is to educate the consumer in detail. We give them technical training on processing the fabric or garment. This ensures that when the consumer sees the garment with our brand name on it, they know it will satisfy their requirements.”

Insights on Lycra applications

Magdalena Kodej, Head of Apparel Research at Euromonitor International gave an interesting presentation on ‘Overview of the sportswear in South Asia: market trends and the evolving consumer landscape’. Kodej shared her views about the sportswear segment in India which has evolved from a niche. She shared market insights on areas that are most important for growth. “Although per capita spend on sports apparel in India remains low compared to other markets, the growth rates have been phenomenal. In fact, the Indian sports apparel market has almost tripled since 2007 and further 2.5 billion dollars (Rs 15,368 crores) is expected to be added to the industry in the next five years. This makes India the most dynamic market globally and presents tremendous opportunities for businesses operating in this area,” Kodej opined.