MAGIC Enters the Sourcing Zone
MAGIC International is ready to explore the brave new world of global sourcing as it prepares to launch an international manufacturer pavilion at next week’s Magic Marketplace in Las Vegas.
Representatives from 200 overseas factories and 16 nations that cater to retailers’ private-label businesses will make up the new Sourcing Zone, which will take up about 20,000 square feet of the Las Vegas Convention Center’s North Hall Feb. 18–21. Representatives from China, Taiwan, Hong Kong, Korea, Mexico, Latin America, Sri Lanka and Bangladesh and toptier factories such as China’s Ace Apparel Network will be on hand. MAGIC will provide retailers with company profiles that indicate the types of products the factories produce along with information on pricing and minimum orders.
MAGIC executives have been preparing for both a quota-free world—coming after the 2005 implementation of the General Agreement of Tariffs and Trade (GATT)—and changing market conditions affected by retailers looking to improve their bottom lines. Private-label development, which eliminates wholesalers, has proved profitable for many retailers as consumers continue to latch on to value-priced products.
Aside from GATT, the North American Free Trade Agreement, the Africa Growth and Opportunity Act and the Caribbean Basin Trade Partnership-Development Act have opened up sourcing opportunities in other countries over the years. Recently, U.S. federal officials announced the elimination of duties within five years on all textile and apparel goods from other Western hemisphere countries as part of a proposed regional freetrade agreement.
“Our timing is perfect for this,” said David Pennes, sales manager for MAGIC’s active/lifestyle/sourcing division. “Private label is a key component of retailers’ product mix, and private label has been uptrending.”
Pennes said MAGIC executives have been exploring a sourcing element since 1999 and cultivating relationships with international factories and buyers for several years. In 2001, the Woodland Hills, Calif.-based tradeshow division of Boston-based publishing group Advanstar Communications set up an international development office in New York headed by former Italian Trade Commission director Gaspare Asaro.
The debut of MAGIC’s sourcing area will be a “soft launch,” Pennes said, but the company will pump more marketing dollars behind August’s edition, which should include more exhibitors and programs. While this show will concentrate on Asian and Latin American volume-oriented companies,MAGIC also wants to bring in more factories from Italy and other countries known for fashion and high-end product.
“But in countries like China, which has 45,000 apparel factories, you can find everything from basic underwear to more sophisticated fashion items,” Pennes said.
Pennes added that MAGIC is positioning the Sourcing Zone as a tool retailers can use to enhance their product-development processes.
“There’s no replacing actually going overseas and doing the quality control and all the steps needed in product development,” he said. “This can be a great enhancement to their businesses. You can see as many factories in four days as you would in one month.”
While MAGIC launches its sourcing show, the ASAP Global Sourcing Show will be on its third run at the Las Vegas Hilton. ASAP will feature representatives from 250 factories and 30 countries. ASAP executives initially approached MAGIC in 2001 to do a sourcing show, but the trade-show giant declined.
“We’ve planned this for a while, and we have the marketplace to do it on our own,” said Pennes. “We have a retail-relations sector that has cultivated relationships for years, so we know what they want.”
ASAP chief executive officer Frank Yuan said he sees MAGIC’s entry into the sourcing area as a fragmentation of the trade-show scene in Las Vegas.
“We need to work together to serve the industry the best way we can,” he said. “We work only with sourcing needs and put our hearts into this and only this.”
