There are plenty of Freelance Activewear Designers out there, many with several years’ experience, however, there are some very clear reasons why you should choose us and avoid them.

Designing the sportswear apparel is only one stage of the process and to progress from the design to the finished garments which will require detailed tech packs, development, samples, sourcing and production, all of which need to hit your target price so you can launch a commercial product.
This is where we differ from other freelance sportswear designers. We offer a complete service to help you create your sportswear apparel; from the brand identity, initial design, through sourcing, sampling, production management, website design and online marketing.
This complete suite of services guarantees the design can be produced to hit your target price at the desired performance and quality, as we understand the capabilities of the factory we select and can source the fabrics from synthetics to organic cotton and components from our huge library to make sure it hits your target price.
By contrast, freelance designers that just produce CAD designs and Tech Packs can’t design to hit your target price points as they don’t know where the fabrics and components are coming from, the cost of these articles and how they affect the overall manufacturing price based on which factory will produce the goods. Without this knowledge of seeing their graphic-design all the way through from concept to production, they are designing blind.
Ask yourself this… “Would you engage an architect to design your new house who had no experience with project managing their designs all the way from the drawing board to a finished build”? Of course not, otherwise you end up with a great picture but neither you nor the designer really understands how much this will actually cost, who might build it and where the materials come from and how much they cost.
It’s also important to understand what the capabilities of the factory are and the relative costs for each type of construction so you can build these into the design, knowing the factory are capable of developing this feature and at a cost that fits with the budget.
We work with a network of trusted factories in Europe and the Far East and we source our clients production based on our clients products. We are completely transparent about who the factory is and we are happy for factory visits to take place if required.
All of our factories confirm the order directly with our clients, just like a builder of a house would work directly with a client rather than the architect trying to build or sub contract the build. Orders are placed directly with the factory and they areal happy for 3rd party QC or AQL visits and reports taking place while production is being carried out.
Every week we get tech packs sent to us from freelance designers and entrepreneurs with no nominated fabrics or trims and no graded size chart. This is no different than an architect passing a lovely design of a house to a builder and simply specifying “WINDOW” where a window has been drawn. The builder, or in our case the factory, would need to know how large if it is triple or double glazed, what standard and performance of glazing is required and what material the frames are made from and a nominated supplier for these.
Most of the tech packs we get provided simply state the material composition – for instance, 80% Polyester, 20% Elastane. The difference in price and performance from fabric mills around the world on this type of blend is huge. We have mills that can supply this type of material for under $2 meter to over $20 meter and when a garment might use 1-3 meters of fabric depending on the style, this needs to be calculated and nominated from a supplier that the designer knows how much they can actually afford.
We also think it’s a huge advantage to have the designer involved in the whole process from design through tech packs, sourcing, sampling, fitting and production so that any adjustments made along the development don’t dilute the original concept. Passing designs from the designer to a tech pack supplier to a factory has already been interpreted 3 times and therefore could easily have been diluted at every stage.
Blue Associates Sportswear was established in 1997 and we have supplied design, sourcing, sampling and production management since then. It’s taken decades of knowledge and experience to really understand how to achieve designs that answer our client’s briefs, not just in terms of style and performance but critically making sure these are commercial too.
If you are looking for a freelance sportswear designer, please request a free quotation here and talk to us to understand the advantages of working with us.
