Fabric Sourcing Calculator

This calculator converts a garment count and a per-garment fabric consumption figure — the yardage your pattern marker actually requires — into a purchase order quantity. It starts with net yardage (garment count times yards per garment), then adds a waste allowance on top to account for cutting inefficiency, marker gaps, and end-of-roll loss that never makes it into a finished garment; typical waste runs 10–15%, though print-matched or directional fabrics can run higher. The result, gross yardage, is your true order quantity — the number to hand your mill or converter.

That total is also divided evenly across your colorways to give a per-colorway cut quantity, useful for placing separate dye lots or prints. Total Square Footage converts the yardage into an area figure by treating fabric as linear yardage at a given width: each yard of length is 3 feet, so the calculator multiplies total yardage by 3 (yards to feet) and by fabric width in feet (inches divided by 12) to get square feet — a figure useful for comparing costs across different roll widths or for non-apparel material estimates. A common mixup: this model divides the order evenly across colorways, but real production runs are rarely split evenly — a hero colorway typically needs more units than a limited accent color, so treat the per-colorway figure as a planning baseline to adjust against actual sales forecasts, not a literal cut ticket.