Garment Finishing

Our garment finishing and processing runs from press to protective packaging. You can take the whole sequence or pick only the stages you need.

Garment Pressing

Every garment is pressed to a crisp, wrinkle-free finish before it moves on. Pressing is the difference between a garment that hangs properly on a rail and one that has to be steamed by shop staff before it can be merchandised. It also matters for photography, so if the same batch feeds your product shots and your stockroom, press before you shoot.

Precision Folding

Garments are folded with precision so that every unit in a run presents identically. Consistent folding is what makes a stack of shirts look deliberate on a table or in a lookbook, and it is what stops a garment reaching a customer as a bundle. We fold to your specification where you have one, or to standard retail presentation where you do not.

Protective Bagging and Packaging

Protective bagging keeps garments secure and spotless in transit and in storage. Presentation is only half of it. Bagging guards against dust, moisture and rub marks between the factory and the point of sale, and it makes picking and packing faster at the other end because units stay separated and identifiable.

Tagging and Swing Tags

Custom tags and labels that reinforce your brand identity, applied to your garments as part of the finishing run. Because we also run a printed media service, swing tags and stickers can be designed, printed and applied in one place rather than sourced from a third supplier and shipped in to be attached. That removes a handover and keeps tag stock in step with the garment run.

Brand, Size and Care Labelling

Brand, size and care labelling applied to your specification. Labelling is where own-brand production either looks credible or does not, and it is usually the detail that decides whether a garment can enter a retail environment at all. Tell us what your labelling requirement is and we will confirm what we can apply and how it fits into the run.

Garment Reprocessing and Rework

Existing garments updated or adjusted to meet new specifications or standards. Reprocessing covers stock that already exists but is not sellable in its current form: a run that needs to move to a new specification, garments carrying the wrong labelling for a new market or account, or product that has been sitting and needs bringing back up to standard before it goes out. If you are holding stock you cannot currently sell, this is usually the service you need, and it is normally cheaper than replacing the units.

Retail-Ready Finishing for Clothing Brands and Retailers

Retailers do not accept garments that need work on arrival. If you are supplying an account, the expectation is that units land pressed, labelled, tagged, bagged and countable, in a state where they can go straight to the floor or straight into the retailer’s own distribution flow. Getting that wrong is expensive, because the cost lands as a chargeback or a rejected delivery, not as a line on a quote.

We finish to that standard by default. If your account has a specific presentation requirement, send it through with the brief and we will work to it. This is the same finishing operation behind our retail supply and own-brand production work, so the process is built around what buyers actually ask for.

How Our Garment Finishing Process Works

Send us the brief first: what the garments are, how many there are, which finishing stages you need and where they have to end up. If we are printing or embroidering the garments as well, artwork and specification are signed off at that point. If you are sending in stock you already hold, we will want to see the condition of a sample before we commit to a timeline, particularly on reprocessing work.

Goods then come in and are checked against the order. Finishing runs stage by stage, with garments inspected as they move through, so a fault is caught while it can still be fixed. Units are pressed, folded, tagged, labelled and bagged to the agreed specification, then packed for dispatch or moved into stock holding, depending on what you have asked for.

Garment Finishing Alongside Print, Embroidery and Dyeing

Finishing is the last stage of a longer process, and it goes better when the people finishing the garment are the people who decorated it. On our Leicester site, finishing sits alongside screen printing, digital printing, hybrid printing, transfer printing, embroidery, appliqué and special decoration and our dyehouse, which can overdye more than 150,000 garments a week.

A print issue is therefore caught before the garment is pressed and bagged, not after it has been shipped to a separate finisher and back. It also means the decoration method can be chosen with the finishing in mind, which counts when a garment is going to be folded in a way that would otherwise put a crease through the print.

Quality Control and Ethical Compliance

Garments are checked as they move through finishing, and anything that is not right does not go into the bag. That is the practical benefit of having finishing in the same building as production: the check happens where the fix happens, so a problem costs an hour, not a fortnight and a return journey.

For brands who have to evidence their supply chain, our Leicester operation has been independently audited. We hold SEDEX SMETA 4-Pillar certification covering labour standards, health and safety, environment and business ethics, including the latest SMETA 7 additions, completed in January 2025. We also completed an Arche environmental audit in January 2025 and engage with the Worldly Higg Index environmental assessment, most recently in December 2024. Full detail is on our sustainability and CSR page.

Finishing, Stock Holding and Fulfilment in One Place

Finishing rarely sits on its own. Most brands who need garments finished also need them held somewhere and sent out to someone, and we can pick that up at whichever point makes sense for you.

Stock inventory management covers holding finished units and keeping visibility of what is where. Dropshipping and fulfilment covers sending single orders out to your customers under your brand. Print On Demand® covers producing and finishing units only as they are ordered, with no minimum and no stock sitting against your cash. If you would rather collect the finished goods and handle the rest yourself, that is equally fine.

Garment Finishing Lead Times and Order Quantities

Our standard production turnaround is 5 to 10 working days from approval of artwork and payment. Finishing-only work on garments you already hold is quoted on the job, because the timeline depends on the volume, the number of stages involved and the condition of the stock when it arrives.

Minimums for finishing depend on the job and are confirmed when we quote. As a reference point on decorated work, our screen printing minimum is 25 pieces, while digital printing and Print On Demand® carry no minimum order. If you have a deadline tighter than the standard window, say so at enquiry stage rather than after the order is placed, because it is often workable when we know early.

Who We Finish Garments For

Clothing brands and own-label retailers who need units arriving in a sellable state. Bands and promoters, through our band and tour merch printing, where merch has to be counted, bagged and on the truck. Charities and campaign groups running branded apparel. Promotional and corporate suppliers finishing printed or embroidered workwear and uniform to a consistent standard. And brands in the middle of a rebrand or a specification change who need existing stock reprocessed rather than written off.

UK Garment Finishing Rather Than Overseas

Finishing overseas can look cheaper per unit and often is. What it costs you is the ability to react. If a batch comes back wrong, the fix is a container away, and by the time it lands the season has moved. Finishing in the UK means you can send a sample, see it back quickly, and change the specification without rewriting the schedule.

It also shortens the gap between a sales decision and stock on the floor. Brands who repeat orders on their best sellers tend to feel this most, because the constraint is rarely the print, it is how long the garment spends waiting to be made presentable. Doing it in Leicester, in the same building as the decoration, takes that wait out.