Textile Insight

TEXTILE TALK | EMILY WALZER got my Covid vaccine shot on the morning of March 12 at a CVS in Fairfield, CT. Following the J&J injection, the pharmacist advised me to hang around the store for 15-30 minutes to make sure I didn't experience any bad side effects. Having become accustomed to Covid- style grab-and-go shopping, it felt odd to wander the aisles in such idle fashion. I lingered by a display of reading glasses, and then lucked out in my hunt for Easter treats securing a bag of Gimbal's Gourmet Jelly Beans, a hard to find brand that I'm told is highly rated by holiday candy connoisseurs. In the refrigerated section a tall, slim can of Coke promoted as "Caramel" and having "great Coca-Cola taste blended with rich, luxurious coffee" caught my eye. Curious for something new, I plucked the Coke from the shelf and headed to check out. As it happened my "vax" shot in the arm came one year to the date of when Covid came to town and everything changed. For me, 365 days of lockdowns and restrictions measured out to a lot of time in front of a computer screen and a lot of strides around the neighborhood to break up the work day. Learning to navigate a new virtual world required leaning into digital tech to do my job reporting on developments within the active/outdoor space. This issue of Textile Insight highlights how Industry leaned-in. Putting their collective corporate shoulders into accelerating investment and initiatives during 2020, companies advanced in ways we wouldn't have dreamed of just a few years ago. For example, our Strategies story, on page 22, explores uncharted territory in our textile landscape complete with digital farm tours and visits to online fabric libraries, while our cover story spotlights supplier efforts to keep pace with our changing world order revealing the newest link in the textile supply network: the consumer. Leveling up consumer connections is especially timely. Results from our Trend Insight Consumer survey, on pages 30-32, confirms this trend; 55 percent of respondents reported having increased interest in knowing where a product is made in the past year, and 65 percent of survey takers said knowing the materials used to make a product was "very important." Covid's shot in the arm, while painful, proved productive in pushing industry and individuals alike to reinvent and move forward. While it's too soon to tell which digital tech investments will pay off and what textile trends will stick, I can report that as a new spinoff, Coke with coffee and caramel flavor works pretty well. Cheers, Covid's Shot in the Arm Injects a Dose of Industry Reinvention 4 • Textile Insight ~ March/April 2021 textileinsight.com Learning to navigate a new virtual world required leaning into digital tech to do my job reporting on developments within the active/outdoor space. I T e x t i l e - B a s e d P r o d u c t S o l u t i o n s We've always looked ahead, anticipating your textile needs while sourcing and developing the sustainable fabric-based innovations of tomorrow. conceptiii.com It's a different world, but our commitment to you remains the same.

• Cover