The US sees China as the go-to country for apparel sourcing. Agents find this country a reliable manufacturer of anything related to clothing. However, for several years now, U.S. imports from China have been going South. As per data from the US Commerce Department, for year ending October 2017, apparel companies imported $27 billion worth of clothing from China, which is a 4.6 per cent drop when compared to the previous year.

Despite this, China accounted for 33.7 per cent of all the apparel brought into the US. That was before India and Vietnam began to raise production in their clothing factories to compete with lower wages and costs. Vietnam was the second favourite for apparel importers and was poised to become a big apparel exporter to the United States through a free-trade pact called the Trans-Pacific Partnership that would have given Vietnamese-made clothes duty-free status. But after President Trump decided to bow out of the TPP, Vietnam lost a great opportunity.

Despite this, the United States enhanced its apparel imports from Vietnam by 6.2 per cent for the year ending October, for a total of $11.4 billion worth of goods. Vietnam now oversees 14.3 per cent of the US apparel import market. Sourcing agents have made Bangladesh the third-largest apparel supplier to US companies.