What to Send a Shirt Manufacturer Before You Ask for a Quote

Every week we receive enquiries that read roughly like this: We need 3,000 men's shirts with our logo. What is your price? We always reply, because there is a real buyer behind it. But we reply with questions, and that costs both sides a week.

The reason is simple. Between a basic poplin shirt and a two-ply yarn-dyed shirt with a custom collar and woven labels, the unit price can differ by a factor of three. A number given without the specification is not a quote; it is a guess that will be revised, and revised quotes damage trust even when the revision is justified.

Here is what a factory needs in order to price your order once, accurately.

1. Garment type and style

Not just shirt. Long or short sleeve. Collar type — classic, cutaway, button-down, mandarin. Cuff — single button, two button, French. Placket — standard, hidden, front-band. Pocket or no pocket. Back yoke with or without pleats. Each of these is a separate operation on the line and each carries cost.

2. Fabric

If you know the construction and weight, give both — 130 gsm cotton poplin, 40s two-ply tells us more than a paragraph of description. If you do not know, describe how the shirt will be used: worn under a jacket in an office, in a hot kitchen, on deck in salt air. We will propose fabrics and send swatches.

3. Quantity, broken down

Total quantity matters less than the breakdown. Three thousand pieces in one fabric and one colour is a straightforward run. Three thousand pieces across four colours and two fabrics is four or five separate runs, each needing its own minimum fabric purchase, and it prices differently. Send the grid: colour by size by quantity.

4. Size range and measurements

European, UK or US sizing, and which size chart. If you have graded measurements, send them. If you have a reference garment you want matched, that is often better than a chart — we can measure it directly.

5. Branding

Woven neck label, printed care label, hem tag, embroidered logo, printed logo. Position, size, colours, thread count. Embroidery is priced by stitch count, so a detailed logo costs more than a simple one and a large one costs more than a small one. Send artwork in vector format if you have it.

6. Packing requirements

Individually polybagged or bulk. Folded flat or hanging. Carton quantity, carton marking, barcode or label requirements. Retail customers usually have strict rules here and discovering them after production is expensive.

7. Delivery date and destination

The date drives the fabric decision more than anything else. A tight date rules out custom-woven fabric and pushes you toward stock ranges. The destination determines freight mode and cost, and whether preferential trade terms apply — shipments from Türkiye into the EU and the UK benefit from customs union and free trade arrangements that materially change landed cost against Asian sourcing.

8. Certifications or compliance requirements

GOTS, OEKO-TEX, BSCI, specific customer audit standards. These affect which mills and which materials can be used, and they must be known before fabric is bought, not after.

If you do not have all of this

Most first-time buyers do not, and that is fine. The list above is what a complete brief looks like, not a barrier to entry. Send what you have and say what you do not know — that sentence alone speeds things up more than a polished but incomplete document, because it tells us where to help rather than where to assume.

What you should not do is send the same vague enquiry to fifteen factories and compare the numbers that come back. Those numbers are not comparable. They are each priced against a different set of assumptions, and the lowest one usually belongs to whoever assumed the cheapest fabric.