Dozens and Dollars of undies imported to USA

Now that we have our Harmonized Tariff Number or HTS which is 6701.11.00.10 we can enter the United States Office of apparel and Textiles or OTEXA at http://www.otexa.ita.doc.gov/ and look up the volume and dollars for imports. I used the common format which is for years 2006, 2007 and 12 months ending Oct 2008 but you can look up years of history if you want too!

I've organized the data on the Google Document in the link below.

http://spreadsheets.google.com/pub?key=pTuOkx70Cy57XF2YTGdBWWA

Some of my highlight's and assumptions based on Dozens of Men's cotton brief imports to the USA 12 months ending Oct 2008
1. 42,218717 dozens were imported at a total imported value of $602,921,084 US dollars.
2. The big guys like Hanes Brands and Fruit of the Loom along with notable local factories are still in Central America and Dominican Republic.
3. 21% of the Total dozens were from Honduras with an average value of $9.36 a dozen, followed by El Salvador with 18% of the total volume and a value of $11.93.
4. Dominican Republic was in 4th place with 15% of the volume and a value of $10.89 a dozen.
5. Think of these as the the current CAFOs (Confined Animal Feeding Operations) of the underwear business churning out pound after pound playing with Preferential Trade Programs to eliminate the 7.2% duty rate. Can bet that there's lots of US cotton (or cotton yarn) being hauled to these countries and then returned to the good ole USA as your Mass produced undies.
6. I love India and I'm glad to see that they are continuing to grow in volume. In 2006 they had 11.5% of volume, 2007 13% and 2008 up to 16%. Most of these companies in India are not the mindless CAFOs but still take the time to think about what they are making and how to improve the lives of their people and country. I still see the wind mill farms on the road from Tirupur going south to the port.
7. So, where's China. Actually China still had volume restraints so the big guys in Latin America could get their production established. In 2008, less than 2.5% of the men's cotton briefs came from China at a whopping average cost of $22.86. If China decides to play in the lowest cost commodity brief business - watch out Honduras, El Salvador and Dominican Republic because the 7.2% duty rate won't stop China.

All for today but please check out the official government link for additional data. And you can look up data for any and everything.

And if you want to know how much your cotton tee shirt should cost or something similar, check back tomorrow. It's all in the cost of cotton, the weight of the garment and how long it takes to sew it up.

bye for today,
The Underwear Maven
http://www.keylargounderwear.com/