As more people get vaccinated and begin to get back to more interactive daily routines, the effects of Covid-19 continue to rest a heavy hand on our industry. The global pandemic has disrupted global supply chains in a way no one has experienced before and we can’t realistically expect everything to bounce back to what it was just because the gloom seems to be lifting.

Our customers may be expecting prices so settle back down now that the worst has (hopefully) past, but that’s just not realistic. Most often it is left up to us to explain to our customers why prices have risen and continue to be high. It’s hard enough running a shop day to day without becoming a supply chain expert, so it’s easy to say “our costs are up too” and leave it at that. And that often doesn’t sit well with customers.

We rely on distributors to supply us with garments, but some deliver much more. We recently received an email from SanMar that got ahead of the curve in announcing not only the unavoidable price increases to come, but a future timeline for when they would go into effect and a clear explanation of the reasons why these increases are unavoidable. We’ve included them here as an infographic supplied by them. We hope this information is useful and that it encourages you to communicate with your regular customers about why you may need to raise prices as well.