What to send a towel manufacturer when you ask for a quote
Most quotation requests we receive cannot be answered as written. Not because the buyer has done anything wrong, but because pricing a towel needs six things, and a first email usually carries two of them. Each missing one is another exchange, and an enquiry that could have been quoted the same day takes a fortnight instead.
Here is what a mill actually needs, and why each one changes the price.
Product and construction
Say what the towel is for before you say what it is. A towel for a hotel bathroom, a resort pool, a spa treatment room and a retail shelf are four different products even at the same weight, because they are washed differently and judged differently.
If you know the construction you want — ringspun terry, zero twist, waffle, dobby border, jacquard — name it. If you do not, describe the use and let the mill propose one. That is a normal question, not an admission of ignorance.
Size
Give the finished size in centimetres or inches. Sizes that sound standard are not: a "bath towel" means something different to a European hotel group and a North American retailer, and a "bath sheet" is defined by its size rather than its weight.
If you are replacing an existing product, measure the one you have after washing rather than quoting the size on its old label.
Weight
GSM — grams per square metre — is the usual shorthand for how substantial a towel feels. Heavier is not automatically better. A heavier towel absorbs more and feels more generous in the hand; it also takes longer to dry, costs more to launder and weighs more to ship. Hotels balancing guest experience against laundry throughput often land lower than they first expect.
As rough orientation, lightweight everyday and gym towels sit at the bottom of the range, mainstream bath towels in the middle, and luxury and spa towels at the top. Tell the mill the feel you want and the washing it will face, and ask what weight delivers it.
Quantity
Give a quantity per colour and per size, not a single total. A mill sets up a dye lot per colour: ten thousand pieces in one colour and ten thousand split across eight colours are different orders at different prices.
If you are not sure yet, give a realistic range and say it is a range. An honest estimate is more useful than a confident number you later halve.
Colour and branding
Say whether you need white, a stock shade, or a specific colour matched to a reference. A matched colour needs a lab dip — a small dyed sample approved before bulk dyeing — which adds time before production but is the only way a reorder lands the same shade as the first order.
For branding, say what form it takes: a woven label, an embroidered logo, a jacquard woven into the towel, printed packaging, or nothing at all. Each is a different process.
Destination and timing
Name the destination port and the date you need the goods, not the date you want to ship. Transit time, customs clearance and the labelling your market requires all sit between those two dates, and they differ by country.
What you get back
With those six answered, a quotation can name a price, a lead time and what the sample will be. Without them, the reply is a list of questions.
None of this has to be perfect. A buyer who can answer four of the six should still send the enquiry — a specification gets built through the conversation, and an approved physical sample is what settles it in the end. What slows things down is not an incomplete brief, it is a brief with nothing in it to respond to.
Send us what you have and our export team will come back within 24 hours, either with a quotation or with the two questions standing between you and one.