It’s the television show which unearths emerging Australian design talent. As filming gets underway for the third season of Project Runway, Assia Benmedjdoub takes a look at how its official fabric supplier has survived over 40 years in the industry.
Dean Sunshine was in hospital with a ruptured appendix when the good news broke. After scouring the city of Melbourne for an official fabric supplier in 2008, producers of Foxtel reality series Project Runway settled on his family business in North Carlton. Rathdowne Fabrics began as a waste textile provider in the 1970s, before moving into fabric retail and wholesale in the 1980s. It was used to mixed fortunes.
“Because I wasn’t here [when the producers came] they spoke with my father Morre, who took over the business from his father Harry,” Sunshine says of the contra arrangement. “The show has done incredible things for us and we go out of our way to make it work. We open at odd business hours if we have to.”
Contestants are required to source fabrics from Rathdowne to complete challenges.
“It can be costly depending on the challange,” Sunshine says. “If you’ve got 10 contestants who are given a budget of $500 each [for instance].”
Rathdowne Fabrics represents the retail arm of the company, with around 30 per cent of its products comprising of surplus stock from designer labels and mid-market brands.
The adjoining space next door, Dean Sunshine Textiles, is a wholesale business which supplies to independent fabric retailers and fashion brands. The warehouse carries half a million metres of fabric at any given time, with a mechanical stretch in 25 colourways being the consistent seller. Over 100,000 metres of this is shifted per year, Sunshine says.
“The strength of Rathdowne retail is buying surplus from local or overseas brands,” he adds. “When we buy a parcel, it can be up to 100,000 metres from a company. We bought something like 50,000 metres off Seafolly last year. If we buy stuff say from Jayson Brunsdon or Collette Dinnigan, they’re often doing original prints and original fabrics not seen anywhere else.”
Despite receiving priority stock, it is not Rathdowne retail which represents the largest part of the business. Dean Sunshine Textiles clinches the greatest portion of sales, followed by its corporate and hospitality division Fabricadabra.
Clients for the latter include department store Myer, which recently sourced display cloths for new locations in North Ryde (NSW) and Robina (Qld). In a climate which has seen multiple fabric store closures over the last decade, including Smouha and Kaldour, Sunshine says Fabricadabra and several smaller side businesses were launched out of necessity.
“What’s happened is the pie has shrunk and there’s less people taking slices of it,” he says, citing the great push towards Chinese manufacturing and supply in the 1990s. “We’re dealing with, from a wholesale level, all the little fabric shops in Australia, where their orders can be anywhere from $200 to $1000 a sale to bigger $20 to $50 grand, which do not happen as often as they used to.
“We used to be able to walk into a factory, buy 100 to 200 thousand metres on a handshake, go out and place a phone call, make a sale and route it straight to the buyer. We didn’t even have to store it in our warehouse: it was sold on the spot. This was back in the day when the local ragtrade existed; there were big buyers, people that were wholesaling would just trade fabrics. It doesn’t happen anymore. As for making fabrics, that’s all overseas.”
According to business information firm IBISWorld, textile product manufacturing fell by three per cent to $1.27 billion in 2009/10 following a decade of difficult trading conditions.
Over the year, enterprise numbers decreased 1.3 per cent to less than 3000 and employment declined 1.5 per cent to 10,000 workers. The wholesale sector has also suffered in the wake of increased demand for discounted products from retailers and the shrinking textile trade. This comes as no surprise to Sunshine, who credits his resilience to catering for niche markets.
“A large part of our business is also mail order, where the girls in the sample room send out samples to a database of thousands,” he says. “When stock comes in, they’ll know which clients will be interested and just like that, boom, we send it out in the mail and receive a lot of business that way.”
The company employs 18 full-time staff across all divisions. There are no minimums set for clients in the retail store, with around a 100-metre minimum for wholesale customers. Fabrics include satins, lace, silks, beading, brocades, printed knits, suiting, woollens, polar fleeces, Lycra, bridal and home furnishings. In addition to the breadth of his fabric offer, Sunshine credits customer service for the companies’ staying power. The approach is warm and simple, even during show time.
“If our customers don’t want to be in the store while [Project Runway] filming is going on, we offer them a little voucher to go around the corner and get a little cake and coffee at no extra charge.”