T-shirts and Tanks

Bangladesh's garment factory owners are expected to agree to raise the minimum wage of workers by about 50 percent to 80 percent, and will charge buyers more to offset the additional input cost, in an effort to put an end to a wave of strikes and protests demanding better pay that affected the output of a fifth of the nation's factories in September.

Bangladesh's government and garment exporters have been under increased pressure to improve living standards and working conditions of garment factory laborers, after a factory building collapsed in April, killing more than a thousand workers ...

Bloomberg Businessweek recently reported on a new apparel company animating T-shirts by cutting holes in the artwork, then placing smartphones or tablets behind the opening and configuring them so an animation would play. Is this a technology you could apply to your apparel marketing?

Last Friday the Toronto Star published an article about one of its writers going undercover in a Bangladesh sweatshop. It's an incredible piece, and one I think everyone in our industry should read.

Facebook's mission to secure its status as the world authority in who knows who—a constant, lumbering quest to improve its advertiser-serving "social graph"—involves more than just parsing your status updates and cataloging your relationships. It also, quite simply, means knowing what you look like. The company's flirted with facial recognition for years to this end—it rolled out and then rolled back face recognition in user-uploaded photos in 2010—and a proposed change to its terms of service, introduced last month, would give it the right to use your profile picture in an effort to enhance it's auto-tagging efforts.

A new movement demands 100 percent cotton in all garments. What about high-quality synthetic tech fabrics?

Montreal-based Gildan Activewear says it isn't finished with its expansion program even after it adds 200 employees at its yarn-spinning facility in Salisbury.

The company plans to spend an additional $200 million to open two more spinning plants in the South, which will bring a total of 700 jobs to the company. Gildan Activewear is in the process of "evaluating potential sites" for the plants, with plans to start operation of both by 2015.

The idea is to "support its projected sales growth and further reinforce its position as a global low-cost manufacturer," the company stated in a press release..

The wearable sensor market looks set to expand with a new sensor-fitted T-shirt and companion device currently being developed in Canada. The Hexoskin system analyzes movement, breathing and heart activity, then sends the data to an online account via a smartphone. It is also designed to make life easier for sports professionals who need to manage teams.

The T-shirt component is machine-washable and water-resistant, and can be worn under any type of sportswear. High-tech, breathable Italian fabric was engineered to keep moisture and heat regulated.

More than 100 Bangladeshi garment factories were forced to shut on Monday as thousands of workers protested to demand a $100 a month minimum wage and about 50 people were injured in clashes, police and witnesses said.

Garments are a vital sector for Bangladesh and its low wages and duty-free access to Western markets have helped make it the world's second-largest apparel exporter after China.

But the $20 billion industry, which supplies many Western brands, has been under a spotlight after a series of deadly incidents including the collapse of a building housing factories in April that killed more than 1,130 people.

Delta Apparel Inc. recently announced that Rod McGeachy will be joining Delta Apparel as president of the company's Soffe division, effective September 17, 2013.

Gildan Activewear Inc. recently announced that the company is one of only two North American companies to be included in the Dow Jones Sustainability World Index in the Textiles, Apparel and Luxury Goods sector, with effect from September 23, 2013.