We believe that investing in a digital and automation strategy is key
AW Hainsworth is a UK-based textile company renowned for its superior craftsmanship and innovative textiles. It has been a market leader, providing high-quality fabrics for royalty, military, emergency services, and various specialised markets worldwide. Hainsworth seamlessly blends traditional techniques with modern advancements, ensuring its products meet the diverse needs of a global clientele while maintaining the highest standards of quality and excellence. In an interview with Fibre2Fashion, Managing Director Amanda McLaren discusses the changes the company has seen over the years, and future plans.
AW Hainsworth has a rich history dating back to 1783. How has the company evolved since then?
Over 240 years, AW Hainsworth has developed a deep understanding of the world of woven textiles. The company has continuously evolved since then, retaining its heritage and traditional qualities of craftsmanship and combining them with cutting-edge innovation and product development. This is all to meet the needs of a growing and diverse global customer base while incorporating new manufacturing methods.
The company supplies a growing number of industries with high-quality woollen cloth and has branched out into producing technical and performance fabrics. This has led to the business embracing innovation and adopting new machinery, technologies, and production techniques.
Sustainability, investment in people, digitalisation, and integrating modern manufacturing technologies are the latest areas of focus in AW Hainsworth’s evolution.
Key moments in AW Hainsworth’s evolution include supplying the British Army with woollen cloth for military uniforms, producing textiles for emergency services, supplying special cloth for the Coronation of Queen Elizabeth II, granting the company’s Royal Warrant, developing patented products, and being awarded a Queen’s Award for Enterprise in Innovation.
Can you describe some of the most significant changes and developments in textile manufacturing techniques that AW Hainsworth has adopted since its inception?
With such a deep heritage, it is no surprise to say that AW Hainsworth has continued to invest in machinery, processes, and systems to protect its future. As innovation has played a bigger role in the last decade and Technical Fabric solutions have embedded themselves into our product portfolio, new manufacturing methods have been introduced. For example, our investment into purchasing two air jet looms, allows us to have higher speed and repeatability to support the growing demands of our global PPE customers.
In more recent years, a significant investment in Raising and Cropping machinery allowed the business to further evolve its techniques in achieving the ‘perfect face-finished woollen cloth’, and almost in parallel, investment in a state-of-the-art laboratory has demonstrated the company’s ongoing commitment to quality control and research and development for future fabric solutions.
How does your company balance traditional craftsmanship with cutting-edge innovation in product development?
As a fully integrated, vertical textile manufacturer, Hainsworth carries out every process from the selection of raw wool to finished cloth in-house and uses traditional manufacturing methods and machinery for blending, carding, conversion, dyeing, printing, spinning, warping and weaving.
In recent years, the business has focused on innovation and product development. To this end, it launched a quarter-million-pound state-of-the-art new, UKAS-accredited laboratory space. This space supports the development of new products and functional performance finishes and allows for rigorous product testing.
How does the company tailor its approach to meet the diverse needs of markets like apparel, technical, and interior fabrics?
With such a diverse product portfolio, it is essential that we understand the ‘DNA’ of each market we operate in. A close relationship with all stakeholders and end customers alike is crucial to ensure we stay aligned with their current and future needs. Building each individual business unit’s strategic plan has been fundamental to our more recent successes, particularly given the impact of macro factors. Essentially, having dedicated expertise to support our customers on their journey with us is of utmost importance.
AW Hainsworth fabrics have clothed royalty and the military for ceremonial occasions. How do you maintain the quality and tradition required for such prestigious applications?
Ceremony is a huge part of national pride, and our customers rely on us to ensure that our fabrics are finished to the most exacting specifications. We use our skills, capabilities, and seven generations of technical expertise to weave and finish these reputable fabrics at our mill in Pudsey.
Known for delivering the first inherently heat and flame-retardant fabrics in the UK, what are some of the latest innovations the company is currently focusing on?
Hainsworth Protective Fabrics recently tested our wildland firefighting fabric ECO-DRY, which contains merino wool. We found that incorporating merino wool fibre into the weave helps draw sweat away from the firefighter’s skin and through the fabric, helping them maintain a manageable body temperature.
Wool has numerous natural properties that make it an optimum-performance fibre. Wool is highly durable, retains its shape well and is naturally water-repellent and odour-resistant (while also having naturally fire-retardant properties). But most importantly for firefighters, wool is excellent at wicking away moisture, with one of the highest moisture vapour adsorption levels of any textile fibre.
Your protective fabrics are used by emergency services around the world. What are the critical factors you consider when designing and manufacturing these types of fabrics?
We listen to the wearers of these fabrics. We innovate, we test, and we apply Fibre Positioning Technology to deliver protection, comfort and quality when it is needed most. To do this, we recognise that innovation is crucial. By exploring new ideas, and new ways of working, investing in new machinery and systems and ultimately enabling further use of technology, we can provide emergency services workers with solutions that keep them safe whilst carrying out their crucial work.
What sets AW Hainsworth’s fabrics apart as the preferred choice for sports like snooker and pool?
Hainsworth TopTable provides a comprehensive range of high-quality woollen snooker cloths manufactured in England, covering the best snooker tables in the world.
The fabrics are crafted using fine wool, research, and innovation, which results in superb cloth construction. These fabrics are designed to facilitate impeccable accuracy, raw speed, and ultimate playability—surfaces that professional players prefer and that deliver sporting excellence at most major international tournaments.
How does AW Hainsworth ensure it stays ahead in an industry as competitive as the textile manufacturing sector?
Our British-manufactured products are second to none. However, we recognise that we remain under threat from competition both overseas and within the UK. As such, we need to protect our cost bases with technological investment and advancement. We also recognise that our people are the key to long-term sustainability. Therefore, it is so important to protect the remaining Yorkshire-based textile businesses.
What are the latest trends and innovations in the textile industry, and how are they shaping the future of textile manufacturing at AW Hainsworth?
Our market sectors behave differently, but certainly, in the field of Technical Fabrics, innovation is the key. We are wholly committed to looking at future textile solutions, and having recently invested in hiring postgraduate technical textile technicians to complement our existing team of experienced technologists, we are freeing up time to work with end customers and specify the next generation of fabrics.
How is AW Hainsworth adopting sustainable practices and technologies in textile manufacturing?
We recognise the importance of a strong sustainability strategy in our business. Our partners and customers are globally conscious and expect us to align. As a Royal Warrant Holder, we are hugely dedicated to our sustainability strategy and for the textile manufacturing environment as a whole, the strategy is very much ‘reduce’. We consume huge amounts of water and general utilities, but by investing in a digitalisation strategy and embedded automation and technology where practical, we can reduce our waste, create a leaner manufacturing process, and free up our resources, giving us the space to upskill and enjoy a wider remit of responsibility. Having invested recently in a Head of Sustainability & Engineering to work alongside our Sustainability Engineer, we are dedicated to delivering by having the resources available.
How has globalisation impacted AW Hainsworth, particularly in terms of supply chain management, production costs, and market competition?
Since Brexit, COVID-19, and the emergence of the Russia-Ukraine war, it is clear that macro factors have become a significant challenge to many UK manufacturing businesses. AW Hainsworth is no exception. Whilst we have had to reposition some strategies, it is clear that as a global exporter of premium quality fabrics, we still have a strong brand image and potential to grow our experience into other global territories. Production costs remain firmly under the spotlight and certainly, from a supply chain perspective, our commitment is with our long-standing partners, where we have the ability to collaborate for mutual benefit.
What technological advancements are having the most significant impact on improving efficiency, quality, and sustainability in your textile production?
We believe that investing in a digital and automation strategy is key. Learning more about the variables in our process and mitigating them, then removing them, is fundamental to achieving a lean and efficient manufacturing model in the future. Having objective data to analyse is crucial, and in traditional textile manufacturing, this was not always the case. Our investment in our Engineering Division is a key step in ensuring that we have the resources to introduce process advancement, where change is wholly justified.
What are the biggest challenges AW Hainsworth faces regarding workforce development, and what strategies are being employed to address skills gaps and labour shortages?
Working in the textile sector is a space full of challenges and opportunities. There are a wide range of roles which are exciting, interesting, provide opportunities for learning and development and essentially, can offer long-term career prospects. However, as an industry, we need to present ourselves better and we need to show there is investment, excitement, and prospects – and that mills are cool places to work! We need to not look to others to create this, but lead from the front, with passion and influence, to ensure young adults are eager to engage and feel inspired.
Understanding the next generation of workers and updating our work environments are essential steps to ensure our financial models are sustainable. It is vital for us to engage our employees, and provide fair wages and training opportunities that retain individuals with unique skills in the sector.
At AW Hainsworth, we actively pursue innovative product solutions by investing significantly each year and prioritising our people strategies. We place a strong emphasis on employee welfare, including mental health and wellbeing programmes, engagement events, and ensuring good workplace conditions. When our employees see positive changes, they respond to them and, quite frankly, deserve them. Our people are central to everything we do, and we are proud of each and every one of them.
Looking to the future, what are your company’s strategic goals for the next decade?
As a British manufacturer of high-quality fabrics for a cross-section of end uses, we intend to capitalise on many years of success as we continue to build an agile, flexible, responsive and supportive business model for all our stakeholders to enjoy. Our goal is to extend our global reach and explore new territories and product applications alongside our existing portfolio. We believe our expertise is unique and that we can continue to offer highly innovative and credible solutions to customers old and new.
With the full support of the Hainsworth family, we will continue to invest and grow, ensuring our unique business remains one of national pride.
We are excited about our future, and everyone is working very hard as a team to deliver against our strategic plans. We are very proud to be a key player in the UK textile sector and have every intention of exceeding our current and future expectations.
