The effects from the COVID-19 recession are still shaking out, but there’s wide agreement that fashion is going to go through big changes. PI Apparel, a membership community for apparel and footwear professionals, hoped to forecast some trends Sept. 10, when it produced a webinar named "PI Live Discussions: Re-think the Supply Chain and Empower On-demand Manufacturing."

Talking about some trends such as 3D printing and increasing digitalization of the fashion business was Omer Kulka, chief marketing officer of Kornit Digital, a digital-printing company for the garment, apparel and textile industry. It runs its North American operations in Englewood, N.J. Also speaking was Andrew Lunt, director of T-Shirt & Sons LTD., one of the United Kingdom’s largest screenprinting companies. Alex Wilcox moderated the webinar.

Lunt said that while traditional methods of making tees, such as screenprinting, remain popular, on-demand printing, where companies make smaller runs of clothing with custom designs are getting popular. Lunt also noted that industry forecasters are talking about placement printing, a term for producing ready-to-wear, not just T-shirts in printers There’s also talk of 3D printing, or producing a three-dimensional item in a printer. The item is based on a digital model downloaded by the computer.

Kulka said that it’s a long way before 3D printers would make clothes with the finesse of what one would expect to see in a boutique. But there’s no ignoring that the business is changing quickly. “The fashion industry is undergoing a digital transformation,” Kulka said. “The on-demand model is so much more sustainable than any other model around. The digital transformation will allow us to provide data to allow transparency. Consumers are demanding it.”