中国制造拯救了这家美国服装品牌

拉飞逸148是纽约的一个时装品牌，始于1996年曼哈顿中国城的一家工厂。几年前由于美国的租金和其他成本猛涨，拉飞逸把生产移到了中国。拉飞逸148的CEO和联合创始人德尔德雷·奎恩，周二在加州尼古湖市《财富》杂志举办的最具影响力的商界女性峰会上说，在纽约“我们就是没法盈利”。

奎恩的合伙人，当初中国城工厂的房东Shun Yen Siu和Ida Siu，回到了她们的家乡中国汕头，并在那里建了新工厂。尽管搬厂之后成本显著下降，但她们的运作却更接近于按订单制作的意大利时装店，并没有“中国制造”商标一般蕴含的廉价劳动力意味，奎恩补充说。

奎恩在一次初创企业创始人会议上提到：“人们一想到中国制造，就觉得‘唉， 不行,’但事实上中国制造不可思议。如果有人想去参观一下，我真的会很自豪。”

汕头工厂有多个楼层，每一层都有专业分工。奎恩说：“这一层楼是牛仔布，这一层是手工穿珠装饰。我们实际在做的，就是为客户定制。”

当然，拉飞逸148在纽约仍有基地：公司刚从Soho区的总部（拉飞逸街148号）搬到了布鲁克林造船厂区的7万平方英尺的巨大复式公寓里。（财富中文网）

译者：宣峰

Lafayette 148, a New York-based clothing brand that started in a factory in Manhattan’s Chinatown in 1996, moved its manufacturing to China a few years ago, as rent and other costs skyrocketed in the U.S. “We just couldn’t be profitable” in New York, said Deirdre Quinn, co-founder and CEO of Lafayette 148, at Fortune’s Most Powerful Women Summit in Laguna Niguel, Calif., on Tuesday.

Quinn’s co-founders, Shun Yen Siu and Ida Siu—the proprietors of the original Chinatown plant—moved back to their hometown of Shantou, China, and built the new factory there. Although the relocation has cut the retailer’s costs significantly, the operations more closely resemble the made-to-order fashion houses of Italy than the cheap labor connotations of a “made in China” label, Quinn added.

“People think of manufacturing in China and they think ‘oh no,’ but really it is unbelievable,” Quinn said during a panel of startup founders at the conference. “I’m really proud when people want a tour of it.”

The Shantou factory has multiple floors, each focusing on different details of the clothing. “It is one floor for denim, one floor for hand beading and embellishments,” Quinn said. “What we’re really doing is customizing for our customer.”

Of course, Lafayette 148 still maintains a foothold in New York: It just moved its original headquarters in the Soho neighborhood (at 148 Lafayette St.) to a massive 70,000-square-foot loft in the Brooklyn Navy Yard.