Knowledge Library
What Is a Factory Package? Everything a Factory Needs to Produce
Tech pack vs factory package
The terms overlap, but there is a useful distinction. A tech pack specifies a single garment — its flat, measurements, materials, and construction. A factory package is the full production-ready set: the tech pack plus the graded pattern files, the grade rules, the size chart, and the costing inputs a factory needs to quote and produce at scale across the whole size run. Where a tech pack answers 'what is this garment,' a factory package answers 'how do we produce this garment, in every size, at cost.' A complete factory package is what actually goes to production.
What a factory package contains
A factory package brings together everything production requires. It includes graded pattern pieces in AAMA format — the industry-standard cut files — for every size in the run. It includes the technical flat and construction sheet, sequenced in sewing order. It includes the full bill of materials with placement and quantity, so the factory can source and cost. It includes the points-of-measure sheet with tolerances for quality control, and the grade rules and size chart that define the run. Colour is specified in Pantone TCX. Together these let a factory quote accurately, sample correctly, and produce consistently.
Why the package must be production-sequenced
A factory reads a package in the order it works, not the order a designer thinks. Construction described in design logic — by aesthetic priority — slows the line, because a machinist has to reorder it mentally. A package sequenced in sewing order lets the floor work straight through. The same applies to the BOM and cut files: organised for production, they speed sourcing and cutting; organised for presentation, they invite mistakes. A good factory package is written for the person who will build the garment, which is a different discipline from designing it.
Why completeness protects cost and time
The commercial value of a complete factory package is that it removes ambiguity, and ambiguity is what produces wrong samples and delayed quotes. When a factory has every measurement, every material, and every construction step with nothing left to interpret, it can quote quickly and sample right the first time. When the package is incomplete, the factory guesses or asks, and each guess or question is a cost in time. Completeness is not a nicety; it is what keeps a production timeline on schedule and a costing accurate.
Producing a factory package efficiently
Assembling a factory package traditionally requires a technical designer and a grader working together — specialist roles and real time per style. Because the components follow consistent rules and derive from the design and the size chart, the work can be systematised. Lyons Intel assembles a complete factory package — graded AAMA patterns, tech pack, BOM, points of measure, and grade rules — from a single design in one pass, in the formats a factory can load directly, so the package is production-ready without a revision cycle.