To keep prices competitive, several Quebec companies manufacture their products in Asian factories. Others have recently repatriated their production to Quebec, mainly for ecological reasons. What are the challenges and benefits of making a transition to actually being made in Quebec ?
On a sunny Monday in May, in the workshop of Poches & fils, five designers gave themselves the challenge of sewing 465 colored pockets on t-shirts. Some of these pockets are personalized, decorated with family photos or a pet. Others were designed by the company’s designer, collaborating artists or partner companies.
“We made pockets for all the SAQ taste tags,” says CEO Camille Hamelin, pointing to a piece of fabric bearing the inscription “aromatic and supple.”
Until April 2021, the sweaters were imported from China before the whimsical decorations were added to the premises on rue Parthenais, in Montreal. They now arrive from the Eastern Townships, made to measure by Attraction.
“We wanted to reduce our ecological footprint,” explains Ms.me Hamelin, whose 15-employee business sews around 50,000 pockets a year.
“In Asia, we were a small customer of a large supplier,” underlines Anthony Vendrame, president of Poches & fils. We had to order large quantities which put pressure on our cash flow. Here it is much more flexible. To inspect the quality, it is much simpler too. We can go there and be more reactive. »
His team therefore began a transition shortly before the start of the pandemic, which was costly in time and energy. This shift has made it possible to obtain contracts with organizations that favor local procurement. The official Earth Day 2022 t-shirt has notably been entrusted to the company.
higher prices
In return, Poches & fils now pays about double for its clothes, which has forced the company to increase its retail price. A t-shirt with a basic pocket went from $37 to $45 in two years.
Is it for this reason that sales have decreased overall? Hard to say. Butme Hamelin would not turn back. She is proud to be able to say that her sweaters are produced in Quebec.
The fabric used by Attraction, in organic cotton and recycled polyester, is also knitted in Quebec or Ontario. The fiber, on the other hand, comes from abroad, in the absence of local suppliers, explains the vice-president of operations at Attraction, Julia Gagnon.
For Attraction, it is also a challenge to have the price of the t-shirts accepted, since the wages of sewing machine operators are higher than in Asia. In the context of a labor shortage, finding workers is also a headache.
Still, Attraction’s made-in-Quebec clothing brand, called “ethica,” has become the most popular with companies ordering promotional products. Before the pandemic, it was rather the range of imported clothing, called “initial”, which held the top spot.
Puzzle to produce a Quebec watch
The leaders of Montres Solios also have the ambition to manufacture their solar-powered watches in Quebec. But it’s not for tomorrow morning. Instead, they have a multi-year plan that begins with setting up a robotic assembly line at their Montreal facility.
“We realized that no company was making, producing and assembling watches in North America,” says Samuel G. Leroux, co-founder of Solios, about his research carried out during the creation company three years ago. “We have to invent an industry. »
Without local expertise in mass watchmaking, it was unrealistic to assemble watches in Quebec that wanted to be eco-responsible while being affordable. For the assembly of the dial, Solios therefore opted for Hong Kong, one of the places where there is a workforce specialized in the matter. The bracelet is assembled in Switzerland.
But Solios says it is working with the National Research Council of Canada to set up an assembly line made up of several robots performing unique tasks within a year. “We are talking about several hundred thousand dollars, even a million, to set it up. That’s almost our entire turnover,” says Mr. Leroux, who hopes to be able to do all of his assembly in Quebec within three years.
The other challenge is to find local suppliers for the multiple parts and materials that make up a watch, and that these meet their needs. For example, for environmental reasons, they wanted to use vegan leather without polyurethane or polyvinyl chloride. However, Mr. Leroux and his team were only able to find producers in France and Germany. At the moment, Solios works with about fifteen suppliers from different countries.
Here again, the company is busy creating certain components in Quebec. With the company Nanogrande, she is testing prototypes in order to manufacture dials in biopolymers by 3D printing.
For some other businesses, such as Boutique Ricardo, which sells kitchen accessories, supply challenges and higher prices are real obstacles to entirely Quebec-based production. The availability of certain materials, such as silicone and electrical components for small household appliances, partly justifies their choice to machine their production in China and Vietnam.
“If we were to market products of a nature other than kitchen accessories, it could be envisaged to have production in Quebec. But for this type of item, sold in hundreds of points of sale, our supply is too large for us to be competitive in terms of price,” says Nathalie Carbonneau, vice-president of communications for Ricardo Media.
It is therefore unlikely that we will soon be able to buy a purely Quebec slow cooker.