Loom Story

The process of planning and designing is done in a participatory manner so that there is acceptability of design at the weaver level. The designs are developed balancing the skills of the weaver as well as the feedback from the customers. Considerable time is spent in planning and allocation of the designs to the weaver long before the weaving process starts. The internal ERP system helps in planning and implementation of the entire weaving and sales processes.

After a combined production planning of both the producer companies for every quarter, yarn procurement, dyeing and yarn bundling are undertaken in a centralized manner. During production, planning and design capacities of the looms, and orders are taken into account to arrive at a detailed plan along with budget. Colour combinations and layouts are developed before the procurement of yarn.

After yarn is bundled according to the design, staff of the Producer Company complete the pre-loom processes and issue the warp to the weavers and carefully monitor the production. Once the finished product is deposited by the weavers, designated Quality Checking team completes the quality check looking at the layouts for design specification, labels the product and is keep it ready for dispatch/sale.

For all our products, we use the best quality cotton yarn sourced from mills in Andhra Pradesh and Tamil Nadu. Khadi yarn spun on the Ambar charkha is sourced from Tamil Nadu. Our cotton yarn is dyed using cabinet dyeing technology whereas the khadi yarn is still manually dyed due to smaller hank size. We use only azo-free reactive dyes and vat dyes for dyeing our brilliant and color-fast shades. For the natural dyed pastel shades, we use plant materials like barks and flowers, and a completely chemical-free dyeing process using High Temperature High Pressure (HTHP) dyeing technology. The Indigos and Reds are dyed in traditional manual dyeing processes. Silk is dyed manually using acid dyes. Chitrika has been able to consistently achieve Grade 4/5 for color fastness for almost all shades which is considered ‘Good-Very Good’ by industry standards.

Our aim is to develop an integrated production system where the production of yarn, dyeing, processing of the yarn, weaving and the end garments are produced in a single location. This will help in reducing the cost, carbon footprint and improve the control over the processes by the producer enterprises.