For a decade, apparel sourcing decisions focused on one question: which country to source from. A rebuilt United States tariff structure is now raising a different question which countries to source from, and how quickly a brand can move between them. The commercial value of this flexibility is rising fast. A new alliance suggests that large sourcing intermediaries now plan to offer this flexibility as a service.
On July **, ****, India’s PDS Limited and Indonesia’s Busana Apparel Group announced a strategic partnership covering six manufacturing locations-Indonesia, India, Bangladesh, Nicaragua, Honduras and Italy. The partnership is designed to help brands shift orders as tariffs, costs, capacity and delivery needs change. Legally, the deal is modest. It is a non-binding alliance with no disclosed equity stake or investment. It gives PDS’s manufacturing arm access to Busana’s existing multi-country network. The ability to take advantage of tariff differences almost in real time is becoming a sourcing capability.
Tariff gap that could put Central America back on the sourcing map
