Where Homegrown Cotton shirts are made
Most apparel companies in this directory name the sewing and stop. This one names the farm, the gin, the spinner, the knitter, the dyer and the cut-and-sew shop, each with the town it is in.
| What | Recorded as | In the company's own words |
|---|---|---|
| The company, about itself | Made in USA, as claimed | Cotton is grown and harvested at McIntosh Farms in Williamsburg County, South Carolina. The cotton is ginned at Humphrey Coker Gin in Salters, South Carolina. The lint is spun at Hill Spinning in Thomasville, North Carolina. The yarn is knitted at White Plains Knit Fabrics in Jefferson, South Carolina. The fabric is dyed at South Fork in Lincolnton, North Carolina. The shirts are embroidered, cut and sewn at Craig Industries in Lamar, South Carolina. The final shirt was completed just 40 miles from the fields where it was grown. |
Why six names beat one badge
A badge is unfalsifiable. Six company names and six towns are a set of claims a reader could pick up the telephone and check, and that is the difference between telling someone something and letting them find out.
It also closes the gap this site spends most of its time on. A garment can be truthfully called American when only the cutting and sewing happened here, because cotton can be grown abroad, spun abroad and knitted abroad before it arrives. Naming the farm removes that question rather than answering it.
The distance is the detail
The page says the finished shirt was completed 40 miles from the field the cotton grew in.
Nothing requires a company to say that, and it is the sort of thing that cannot be said unless it is true, because the six businesses named are the ones who would know. Compare it with the commonest sentence on this shelf, which is a country and nothing else.
What this page does not establish
It describes a polo. It is written in the second person, about the shirt the reader is holding, so the chain is given for that product and the page does not say every item the company sells moves through the same six businesses.
That is a small caveat on an unusually complete answer, and it is the kind this site records rather than smooths over.