This week I’m bringing some very sad news - that the UK’s only cotton spinning mill, English Fine Cottons, which brought cotton spinning back to Greater Manchester in 2018, has very sadly gone into administration.
In case you don’t know about the history of English Fine Cottons, it was set up by the technical textile spinners Culimeta-Saveguard, who invested £4.8m of its own money, £2m of which was a loan from the Greater Manchester Combined Authority, to regenerate a former Victorian cotton mill and install new technology to create luxury yarn. A further £1m was awarded as a grant by the N Brown Textile Growth Programme.
English Fine Cottons was the start of something very exciting in UK manufacturing, and for this to have happened is tragic. The collapse into administration is caused by the parent group Culimeta-Saveguard going down, and unfortunately that has taken the cotton spinning down with it. Something needs to be done to save our only cotton spinning mill, otherwise this is history repeating itself.
So today's episode is a remastered version of a visit that I did to English Fine Cottons in 2019, along with an interview with Andy Ogden, who was the general manager at the time.
161 – 50 years of manufacturing in the UK – John Elliott MBE, Ebac
160 – Should You Start With a Seamstress or a Factory?
159 – Tips for Trading With the EU as a Small Business – Rachel Bowditch
158 – What is a Critical Path and Why do You Need One?
157 – Tapping into Deadstock Materials – Dessy Tsolova
156 – 5 reasons why you might not be able to find a UK manufacturer
155 – Creating change in the UK fashion industry – Lee Akpareva
154 – Made in UK vs Made in Britain
153 – Building a family business in post-Brexit Britain – Gillian Tusting
152 – Are you charging enough for your UK-made products?
151 – 10 years of Make it British – what’s changed?
BONUS EPISODE: Made in UK Day
150 – 11 trends for 2021 and beyond
149 – A look back on 2020
148 – How to promote a UK-made brand
147 – Catherine Erdly, The Resilient Retail Club
146 – LIVE: No Black Friday
145 – Revisited: James Eden, Private White V.C.
144 – Revisited: The Making of Make it British
143 – Kath Whitworth, Celtic & Co
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