What is PLM Technology in the Apparel Industry?

The fashion industry has come a long way from the days of bustles and corsets. In today’s world, with its blink-fast fashion trends and fierce competition, it takes more than a few days of sewing to get a product to market.  It takes creativity and the ability to track your progress. Which means it also takes product life cycle management.

To put things simply, the abbreviation PLM stands for Product Lifecycle Management.

The lifecycle management of a product begins from the moment of that product’s conception and continues all the way through to its disposal as an actual product. Looking at it from a fashion perspective, this would mean that it would be seen through from its conception, the designers sketch, all the way through to its design and manufacture, then on to the clothing racks in your local shop.

Product lifecycle management is the engineering aspect of the product, from managing its descriptions and properties through to its development and tracked throughout its life. The entire process of manufacture is taken into account. This means that all people, products and materials used to create the line of clothing are integrated into the lifecycle and constantly monitored and updated.

Typical PLM tools tend to focus only on the release stage of the product where as people-centric PLM focuses more tightly on the design phase of the product. The fashion industry provides a unique blend of both traditional PLM tools and the more people-centric tools.

Many large fashion houses have taken to using a variety of PLM software that permits them to have both tighter controls over their lifecycle process as well as providing a means of more fluid collaboration and information sharing. This has resulted in improved productivity and workflow.