Building the Performance Cluster in North Carolina:
Providing Assistance to Enhance Global Market Competitiveness of the North Carolina Textile Industry

Holli Nelson, Graduate Student

The North Carolina State University College of Textiles received a research grant from the North Carolina Department of Commerce to conduct a thorough analysis of the performance textile industry in North Carolina and provide the framework for building a “performance cluster” in North Carolina. Dr. Nancy Cassill was the principal investigator of the project, along with assistance and guidance from Dr. Blanton Godfrey, Dr. Trevor Little, and project manager, Holli Nelson.

In today’s global marketplace, companies are challenged to provide differentiated products. Performance textiles are textile materials and products manufactured primarily for their technical and performance properties in addition to their aesthetic or decorative characteristics (definition adapted from various sources, including “technical textiles” definition from Horrocks & Anand, 2000).

Primary and secondary data sources provided an overview of production and market dynamics, a shift in marketing strategies, industry characteristics, a profile of the performance industry in North Carolina, and sub-sector definitions and cluster dynamics in North Carolina. A focus group was conducted in the second stage with 53 personnel from 34 companies representing the North Carolina performance textile industry.  Focus group results provided program direction and “next steps” to assist North Carolina performance textile performance companies in achieving global competitiveness.

With the global growth (production, consumption) of performance textiles, this industry is a viable opportunity for North Carolina companies. North Carolina has approximately 517 companies competing in the performance textile industry. Of these 517 companies, approximately 148 companies compete in multiple performance sub-sectors. Eleven percent of the companies competing in the performance textile industry in North Carolina are publicly held and 89% percent of the performance textile companies are privately held.

Currently all 12 performance textile sub-sectors exist in North Carolina, with  76 out of 100 counties having a presence in the performance textile industry. Collectively performance clusters provide an estimated $18,094,043,464 in annual sales. There are approximately 60,000 employees working in the performance textile industry in North Carolina.  The largest performance textile sub-sectors in the state (companies, employment, sales) are industrial, apparel, and transportation.

Performance textiles provide opportunities for all North Carolina companies. Companies competing in the industrial, transportation, apparel, protection, home furnishings and medical sub-sectors have the most presence in terms of estimated sales dollars and company locations. These sub-sectors build on North Carolina’s traditional textile expertise and their strong presence reflects North Carolina’s textile infrastructure.

 In order for North Carolina to be competitive in the performance textile industry, company personnel has several programmatic needs; these include seminars on new product development and innovation, market dynamics, supply chain dynamics, industry standards, environmental and ethical sustainability, and strategic human resource development.  In addition, focus group participants indicated a need to provide additional attention to focus group discussion (in smaller focus group participant composition) to very technical applications such as geotextiles, medical and industrial markets.

College of Textiles
P.O. Box 8301
Raleigh, NC 27695-8301
Telephone: (919) 515-6632
FAX: (919) 515-3733
JTATM Privacy Policy

Last Site Revision:
August 28, 2007