Tell us about your company, which manufactures custom collegiate-logo sportswear for infants and children. We sell primarily to the collegiate market – college bookstores and stores around college bookstores. We opened in 1986. Between our Houston, Mo., plant and (Ozark), we have 75 to 100 employees. We have a force of about 30 independent sales representatives across the country who go out and call on the accounts. … We have accounts in all 50 states.
How has your industry changed in the last 24 years?When we switched to manufacturing kids’ clothes in 1986, there was still a lot of domestic manufacturing, and this (sector) of the market was underserved. … The niche became kids’ stuff, and doing it custom. …When we started … this area had a very vibrant stitching industry, not only in garments, but also in shoes. Every small town had factories. … It was actually very competitive for employees. Unfortunately, a great deal of that industry has gone offshore.
Why have you kept headquarters in Ozark?My wife, Julie, and I both grew up in Springfield. This is our home turf. … To do our product line minimums would be almost impossible to import, so the choice is cutting our line back, having kind of a bland, cookie-cutter product mix, or keeping it different and vibrant and making every one of our customers’ stores look different. What we’re able to with low minimums is manufacture (products) to a specific store and school, and not have to say no very often (to customers). There’s a good work force. People still know how to work here.
Describe your manufacturing operations. We have hundreds of sewing machines. We purchase the raw materials and keep them in our warehouse. We use computerized marking equipment. Our cutters are all computerized cutters so we can run quickly through low volume and have excellent quality on cutting. … We do what we call mod-sewing. When we first started … we did line sewing (and) an individual basically did a single, or two or three operations on a product. … It was an assembly line-type of production. With mod-sewing or team sewing, we put together two or three operators with (similar) skills (and) they have all the sewing machines they need to complete, from start to finish, a garment, or an order. … Our through-put is quicker; we don’t have bottlenecks. Our quality is better because we can trace it back. … Quality is important if we want to keep jobs here.
How has the recession affected your business?Yeah, we can feel it. We’ve ridden through 9-11. We survived the first Gulf War. And what those things have done is put uncertainty and fear in the future. We didn’t have people cancel their orders during those. (As) a custom manufacturer, if we don’t have orders, we don’t work. So the recession, even though we’re selling to a market that’s more recession-resistant – grandmothers like to buy stuff for their kids and grandkids before they buy for themselves – everyone’s cut back a bit. I think now, we’re back on the upswing.
How did you get into manufacturing?While I was in school, I started my first company, a traveling summer camp. We took kids backpacking through the western United States for five or six weeks at a time, and we also had a small backpacking and hiking shops. This was in the early 1970s. … We also had a canoe rental business … in Arkansas on the Mulberry River. … I was selling a very unique product for a company out of New Mexico – a sleeping bag and cold-weather gear – and we struck a deal as the sole distributor for the United States, so I was selling it to other backpacking stores, and they couldn’t manufacture it. All of the sudden, we had orders, but we had no products, so I (said), “I know business. I can buy fabric. I just have to find someone who can sew. … Wayfarer Products was the first company (and) it just evolved out of camping gear to T-shirts and sportswear.
