At work, a merchandiser is often asked one plain question: where an order currently stands. Answering well means more than checking whether cutting has started. It means knowing the full sequence an order travels through, so you can point at exactly one place in it and say what has happened, what has not, and what evidence proves it.
Without this picture, people guess. A new merchandiser sees a signed purchase order and assumes the factory can start cutting fabric that same day. A production manager sees fabric arriving and assumes samples must already be approved. Both assumptions skip a stage, and skipping a stage is how a factory ends up producing against a specification nobody actually confirmed.
This lesson gives you the whole sequence, once, so every later lesson in this course can go deeper into one stage of it without you losing the map. Lesson 5.2 opens up sampling inside approvals. Lesson 5.3 looks closely at confirmation. Lesson 5.4 tracks production stage by stage. Lesson 5.5 covers inspection, shipment and closing the order.
You need: nothing but this page. Lessons 1.2, 1.3 and 1.5 are mentioned because they cover ownership, pricing and the detailed 16-week timeline, but you do not need to have read them first.
By the end of this lesson you can:
Not covered here: the sampling steps inside approvals (lesson 5.2), what a purchase order must confirm (lesson 5.3), day-by-day production tracking (lesson 5.4), and the inspection and closing checkpoints (lesson 5.5).
| Term | Meaning |
|---|---|
| Enquiry | A buyer's request for a price on a possible order, before anything is confirmed. |
| Costing | Working out what an order would cost to make, so a price can be quoted back to the buyer. |
| Purchase order | The buyer's written document confirming it wants to place the order, at an agreed price and quantity. |
| Approvals | The stage where samples are made and signed off by the buyer before bulk production starts. |
| Bulk production | Making the full quantity of the order, as opposed to a small sample. |
| Inspection | Checking finished goods against the agreed specification before they are shipped. |
| Closing an order | Formally marking an order finished once shipment and paperwork are complete. |
| Order tracker | A working document that logs each stage of an order against its planned and actual date. |
| Checkpoint | A specific moment in an order's life where its progress is checked against the plan. |
Every apparel order, whether it is made to order or made to stock, sold for export or sold domestically, passes through the same broad sequence: enquiry and costing, confirmation, approvals, production, and inspection and shipment or close. The names on the paperwork and the people involved change from one company to the next, but the sequence itself never changes. Skipping a stage is not possible; only the time spent inside each stage varies from order to order.
| What can differ | The shapes you will meet | Why it matters to you |
|---|---|---|
| What counts as "confirmation" | A signed purchase order (export, full package). A verbal commitment followed by a written order (smaller domestic buyers). A standing forecast with no single order document (Make to Stock, replenished continually). | You must find the document or evidence that marks the moment a buyer actually committed, in whatever form your buyer uses it. |
| What "approvals" covers | For an export order like Order A, several rounds of physical sample approval by the buyer (lesson 5.2). For a repeat domestic style, a much shorter check against an already-approved reference sample. | The time an approvals stage takes can shrink a great deal, but the stage itself is never skipped, even for a repeat order. |
| How production is tracked | Stage by stage against a planned date, as Order A's tracker does (fabric, sewing, inspection and packing). By overall percentage complete, common in smaller factories with fewer systems. | Either way, "production" is really several sub-stages, not one single event that starts and finishes on the same day. |
| What closes the order | Export orders close on shipment plus final documents and payment confirmation (lesson 5.5). Domestic orders on open account may close only once payment is received, weeks after the goods left the factory. | Knowing what closes an order tells you when you can stop tracking it and move on to the next one. |
| Where the enquiry and costing stage happens | With the factory itself, as Order A's costing (lesson 1.3). With an agent such as Meridian Sourcing, who costs on the factory's behalf for a commission. | The company doing the costing changes, but the stage itself, price before commitment, always comes first. |
Order A moves through all five stages in the same order as any other order. Northline Apparel first enquires about a basic cotton T-shirt, and Delta Garments costs it, arriving at the USD 3.20 FOB price built up in lesson 1.3. Northline Apparel then confirms the order with purchase order NA-2291. Samples are made and approved (the detail of this stage is lesson 5.2's subject). Bulk production runs on the 16-week timeline first set out in lesson 1.5. The finished T-shirts are inspected and shipped from Delta Garments' own port, on FOB terms as described in lesson 1.2, and the order is then formally closed.
| Stage | What happens for Order A | Evidence that the stage is complete |
|---|---|---|
| 1. Enquiry and costing | Northline Apparel asks for a price; Delta Garments builds the USD 3.20 FOB costing. | A costing sheet |
| 2. Confirmation | Northline Apparel commits with purchase order NA-2291. | The signed purchase order |
| 3. Approvals | Samples are made and signed off by Northline Apparel. | Approved sample and sign-off record |
| 4. Production | Fabric is bought and dyed, then cut, sewn and finished, over the 16-week timeline. | Goods on the cutting table, then finished cartons |
| 5. Inspection and shipment/close | Goods are inspected, shipped FOB, and the order is closed. | Inspection report, shipping documents |
Lesson 1.5 already set out Order A's 16-week production timeline in six parts: approvals, fabric, sewing, inspection and packing, shipping, and warehouse and distribution. That timeline is not a separate sequence from this lesson's five stages. It is stages 3, 4 and 5 of this lesson's list, written with more detail, once the order has already been confirmed.
A new merchandiser at Delta Garments sees Order A's purchase order NA-2291 has just been signed and tells Karim to start cutting fabric today since the order is confirmed. This skips a stage. Between a signed purchase order and bulk cutting sits the approvals stage: samples must be made and approved by Northline Apparel first. Cutting bulk fabric before approvals are signed off risks producing against a specification that has not actually been confirmed as correct, and it is what causes most quality disputes later, a point lesson 5.2 develops in full.
Every order goes through the same five steps, in the same order: someone asks for a price and it gets worked out, the buyer commits with an order, samples are made and approved, the goods are made, and then they are checked, shipped and closed out. The names change from company to company, and the time spent in each step changes too, but no step can be skipped. A signed order is not the same as an approved order. Before bulk cutting starts, samples must be approved first.
Order A's purchase order, NA-2291, has just come back signed from Northline Apparel. A new merchandiser at Delta Garments is keen to keep the 16-week timeline on track and tells Karim, the production manager, to start cutting fabric today, since the order is now confirmed.
Is starting to cut fabric today the correct next stage? Decide before opening the answer.
No. Confirmation is not the same as approval. Between a signed purchase order and bulk cutting sits the approvals stage: samples must be made and approved by Northline Apparel first, a point lesson 5.2 develops in full.
Two facts decide this. First, the five-stage sequence never allows skipping a stage: production (which includes cutting) is stage 4, and approvals is stage 3, so approvals always comes first. Second, the purpose of approvals is to confirm the specification is correct before it is committed to 15,000 pieces of fabric; a signed purchase order confirms only the price, quantity and terms of the order, not that the physical sample matches what the buyer actually wants.
Cutting bulk fabric before approvals are signed off risks producing 15,000 pieces against a specification that has not actually been confirmed as correct yet.
Lesson 1.2 already established that the cutting stage carries a value of USD 2.45 per piece at risk if a cancellation or a specification problem is found after cutting has started. This lesson does not need to quantify that further; it is enough to see how the risk multiplies with scale.
That amount is not a cost Delta Garments has necessarily lost; it is the value exposed to a specification problem that approvals exists to catch before cutting begins. The earlier a specification error is caught, in approvals rather than after bulk cutting, the smaller the loss.
The tracker's one sheet, "Log", is pre-filled with Order A's six-stage timeline from lesson 1.5. A worked example shows a 5-day sewing delay absorbed by the shipping stage's buffer, so the order still ships on time.
Your own order's five stages map onto these six rows: enquiry/costing and confirmation happen before the tracker's first row; approvals is the "Approvals" row; production is "Fabric" plus "Sewing"; and inspection/shipment or close is the last three rows together.
| Question | Order A (filled in) | Your order |
|---|---|---|
| Current row | Sewing | |
| Planned date | Set by the timeline | |
| Actual date | Logged at finish | |
| Status | "Late" | |
| Notes | "5 days late" |
Do not add new sheets or columns; use the same five columns Order A's example uses.
1. Put these in the correct order: production, confirmation, enquiry/costing, approvals, shipment.
2. Does a signed purchase order mean bulk production can start immediately?
3. A domestic factory making 3,000 jeans for Cedar & Co. on a Make to Stock basis has no single signed purchase order, only a standing forecast. What varies between this order and Order A, if the stage sequence itself never changes?
| EN | AR | FR | TR | Meaning |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Enquiry | استفسار | Demande de prix | Fiyat talebi | A buyer's request for a price on a possible order, before anything is confirmed. |
| Costing | التكلفة (حساب التكلفة) | Calcul du coût de revient | Maliyetlendirme | Working out what an order would cost to make, so a price can be quoted back to the buyer. |
| Purchase order | أمر الشراء (طلبية الشراء) | Bon de commande | Satın alma siparişi | A document from a buyer confirming quantity, price and delivery date, which commits the buyer to pay for the goods it orders. |
| Approvals | الموافقات | Approbations | Onaylar | The stage where samples are made and signed off by the buyer before bulk production starts. |
| Bulk production | الإنتاج بكميات كبيرة | Production en série | Toplu üretim | Making the full quantity of the order, as opposed to a small sample. |
| Inspection | الفحص | Inspection | Muayene | Checking finished goods against the agreed specification before they are shipped. |
| Closing an order | إغلاق الطلبية | Clôture de la commande | Siparişi kapatma | Formally marking an order finished once shipment and paperwork are complete. |
| Order tracker | متعقّب الطلبية | Suivi de commande | Sipariş takipçisi | A working document that logs each stage of an order against its planned and actual date. |
| Checkpoint | نقطة فحص | Point de contrôle | Kontrol noktası | A specific moment in an order's life where its progress is checked against the plan. |
You now know the five broad stages every order passes through, and that approvals sits between confirmation and production. The next lesson opens up that approvals stage and shows the sampling steps inside it, one by one. Back to the course map