International Textile Industry

International Apparel and Textile Market

After reading the book “Triangle, The Fire That Changed America” we learned how the American apparel industry was growing at a fast rate in the early 1900’s, thanks to the industrial revolution and business men like Blanck and Harris, could start companies such as Triangle, which could produce a high quantity of product at more productive speeds. Triangle set up row after row of sewing machines to manufacture clothes in the Arch Building of New York City. At the same time hundreds of immigrants from other countries such as Italy, Russia and Germany were entering America everyday with the dream of making a better life for themselves.

Workers in these apparel and textile factories were paid very low wages and worked in many cases from sun up till sun down. They were crammed in confined and un-safe work environments day after day. Employers had the right to short their pay, and treat the workers any way they wanted because people were so desperate for work. They lived in some cases with other families or relatives sharing one apartment, everyone pitching in just a little to get by. It started little by little with the workers fighting back against the poor working conditions and they started to band together, it took many downfalls, fights, and years but the unions soon overcame and became a strong force in the manufacturing industry national wide. As the unions grew stronger and bigger, manufactures were forced to sign union contracts that would keep pay and benefits at fixed rates, working conditions had to be kept up to union code and weekly hours were now restricted to what the union would agree to. Why did the manufactures sign such agreements, because if they did not the workers would go on strike or what they would call a walkout. If union workers wanted to renegotiate their contract and the manufacture wouldn’t budge on issue, the union would form a picket line, and if a non-union worker tried to take...