Intertek is a leading provider of quality and safety solutions serving a wide range of industries around the world. With the expertise, resources and a global network of testing laboratories for the textile, footwear, toys, petroleum and chemicals etc, they have become a global leader in product quality assurance service. We are pleased to have an interview with Intertek Consumer Goods marketing director Ms. Sara Chen.
G: Global Intimate Wear, Sara: Intertek Consumer Goods Marketing Director
G: How has Intertek been able to help the lingerie companies to break the obstacles and enter the European and US markets?
Sara: Intertek has a history of over 100 years with advanced technology and management experience, especially in the area of textile and apparels. We are familiar with the safety standard of major trade countries and regions, and understand the needs of the consumers. Besides product testing, inspection and certification, we also assist the customers in the production process and logistics. Lingerie is a kind of textile and apparel products which has direct contact with the skin, therefore is subject to more stringent product safety requirement than the garment. Intertek plays the role of a bridge. It consolidates the various requirements from different countries, brings them to the domestic manufacturers, and by way of technical support to help the companies to improve the process and efficiency, break market barriers and lower the risks.
G: Some multinational companies such as Wal-mart and M&S, do they have special requirements for product testing and social responsibility?
Sara: Corporate Social Responsibility auditing firstly requires that the company must comply with local laws and regulations. Besides, some customers may have their own requirements. Regional customers may also have their additional requirements, such as in UK, where SMETA audit is their own requirement on wages, attendance, environment etc.
Wal-mart has their own requirements on social responsibility, namely Wal-mart Supplier Standard, which is Wal-mart's basic expectations for the behavior of its suppliers' workers, and the impact of the workers' living activities on the environment. While M&S is a UK customer, they adopt SMETA, which is applicable to all UK customers.
G: At present, many export companies are turning to the domestic market. What the similarities and differences in the testing requirements between home and abroad, such as the US and the UK?
Sara: Both domestic and overseas test requirements are based on related standards, all of which are the parameters for textile products evaluation. Most domestic testing methods are based on the European standards, which are much different from those of the US. As far as the standards concerned, there are mainly three differences:
Different systems of standard constitution:
The foreign countries emphasis on basic standard and methodological standard, focusing on the unified terminology, unified test method and unified assessment method, in order to make the data provided by the different parties comparable. The standard is released in form of directive when it comes to the product’s safety performance.
China’s domestic standards focus on the products, with both the basic standard and method standard supporting the product standard. There are many product standards categorized by raw materials or process in China's textile product standards, such as woven garments, textile printing and dyeing, knitwear, chemical fiber and so on.
The standards function differently
Foreign standards mainly deal with trading issues, while China's standards aim at both production and trading, providing guidelines for production and trading as well. Due to the historic reasons, China’s standards are still in the phase of production-trading standard, which not only provide technical basis for production, but also safeguard the interests and rights of the consumers, therefore the evaluation index are set up in a high level, and the contents are very detailed. China’s standards set different quality levels such as “superior, first class and qualified", while the foreign standards only define what are qualified and unqualified.
Different levels of standards
For the same testing item, even though the target levels are the same, the results may vary due to different testing methods. Chinese standards are similar to the European standards, but quite different from the American ones. For example, for the dimensional change after wash, the U.S. ASTM standard generally requires washing for 3 or 5 times, while the Chinese standard specifies washing only for once. Also, with different washing machines and drying methods, the two testing methods may lead to quite different results.
G: For the companies which sell in domestic market and want to enhance corporate image by improving product quality control, has it become a trend for them to use third party testing as most of the foreign brands do?
Sara: At present, many foreign brands use the third party testing service to perform the RSL control. Most of the time, the third party testing company and the brand will made an agreement on testing protocol and spot checking system. With enhancing awareness of quality control, more domestic companies or brands have realized the importance of product quality. They not only use the third party to help them in quality control, but even establish their own small laboratories under the guidance of the third party in order to support the daily production.
G: March 1, 2012, Intertek opened its Taobao store and aims to help the businesses to win in the E-commerce market with good quality. What is Intertek’s take on the development of E-commerce market, and what’s your strategic operation plan for the next step?
Sara: E-commerce has become increasingly popular as a business model, and the buyers are more and more enthusiastic about the online shopping. In the continuously expanding online trading market, how to monitor the businesses on the e-commerce platform, including the businesses’ qualification and product quality, has become the primary issue concerned by online consumers, and also the key to regulate the businesses and enhance the healthy development of E-commerce. In order to benefit Taobao sellers with faster and easier access to our services, we opened our official Taobao store. In addition to this Taobao store and quality control on the E-commerce sellers, we are communicating with other E-commerce companies to seek for corporation in other areas.
G: For export, domestic and E- commerce companies, what should they pay attention to in the fields of testing and social responsibility? Can you give us some suggestions?
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