Kanban Applications in Fashion and Textile Industries

This chapter will provide a thorough scrutiny of the Kanban concept, its tools and methods as well as its implementation from different perspectives, especially the application of Kanban in the fashion and textile industries. Derived from a Japanese notion, Kanban means “visible sign”, originated with the efforts of the Toyota automotive company in applying the concept to the manufacturing process. However, Kanban has eventually become a popular methodology that is used widely not only in the automobile industry but also in any other sectors such as fashion and textiles. It has a close correlation with the Lean Manufacturing and Just-in-time systems with the purpose of maximizing productivity and minimizing workplace waste, which has been discussed in this chapter. The Kanban system is designed to help make the workflow as agile and efficient as possible through the utility of signal visualization, thus, to some extent, the traditional Kanban system has been considered even more useful than a computerized system. Implementation of Kanban system has several advantages and disadvantages in the fashion and textile industry to reach an optimal point of production, which are also briefly highlighted. Various case studies focusing on the fashion brands and manufacturers are included in this chapter. Overall, Kanban implementation in fashion and textile industries can help to increase the productivity, control inventory, ensure supplier and employee participation, remove the bottlenecks and improve the quality of the products within the production lines, which are also discussed in this chapter.