Finding the right manufacturer

I had no connections in the apparel industry.

No background in manufacturing.

No idea who to call.

So finding someone who could actually turn our designs into physical pieces was one of the biggest unknowns in building YEOUBI.

Starting without connections

I work as a freelancer and a content creator.

Over time, that introduced me to a lot of people.

And because some of my content is connected to fashion, I slowly built connections within that space too.

Eventually, one connection led to another.

I met people who knew people.

Some of them helped connect me with manufacturers.

And suddenly, the thing I had been searching for started becoming possible.

Learning a new language

Finding a manufacturer was only the beginning.

The more I explored clothing production, the more I realised how much I didn't know.

GSM. Screen printing. DTF. Puff printing. Fabric. Print quality. MOQ. Cost.

Every answer seemed to create five more questions.

I had started with a simple idea:

Make a T-shirt.

Then I discovered how many decisions exist inside something that looks that simple.

Finding the right feel

For YEOUBI, the fabric couldn't just look good.

It had to feel right.

After exploring different options, we decided to work around 240 GSM for our streetwear pieces — a weight that gives us the structure and feel we're looking for.

Then came the printing.

For certain pieces, I wanted something that felt more raw and direct.

That's where screen printing came in.

For designs that require more versatility, we'll also explore techniques like DTF.

The method can change.

The goal doesn't.

The final piece has to feel like YEOUBI.

The people who said yes

Eventually, I found manufacturers I felt comfortable working with.

I tried their samples.

I liked what I saw.

They were cooperative, willing to work with us, and offered some of the best pricing I could find.

So far, there hasn't been a manufacturing disaster.

Yet.

And I'm perfectly okay keeping it that way.

But if building YEOUBI has taught me anything so far, it's this:

Expect the unexpected.

Starting small on purpose

Our final MOQ and production quantities are still being decided.

But we know we want to begin with smaller quantities.

Partly because we're new.

We want room to experiment.

To understand what people connect with.

To try different designs, silhouettes, techniques, and ideas without locking ourselves into huge quantities.

But there is another reason too.

We don't want every YEOUBI piece to exist forever.

We don't want to keep producing the same design endlessly just because it sells.

Most pieces will have a limit.

Once they're gone, they may be gone.

There might be a few exceptions — pieces that become permanent parts of YEOUBI.

But for everything else, we want to keep moving.

New ideas. New experiments. New pieces.

Because YEOUBI isn't supposed to become a factory repeating the same thing forever.

We're still discovering what this brand can be.

And we want the freedom to find out.

From a file to something you can wear

Until this point, YEOUBI had mostly existed as ideas.

A name. A logo. Design files. Plans.

Finding the right people to manufacture our pieces changed that.

For the first time, the distance between something on a screen and something you could actually hold started getting smaller.

We still have decisions to make.

Quantities to finalise.

Samples to approve.

And probably problems we don't know exist yet.

But now, we know who can help us make it real.