“If We Establish a New Dyeing Plant, We will Invest in THEN Machines Again”

Interview: Dilek Hayırlı 

Barutçu Tekstil, one of Turkey’s leading fabric manufacturers and exporters, operates with 450 employees in three different production facilities in Bursa. The company produces 15 million metres of fabric annually and dyes between 15-20 tonnes of fabric daily in its fabric dyeing, dobby weaving, jacquard weaving and digital printing facilities.

Founded in 1991 in Bursa by Lütfi Barutçu, Barutçu Tekstil is one of the leading fabric manufacturers and exporters in the Turkish textile industry. The company, which focused more on yarn trade at the time of its establishment, later became a producer of raw fabrics. Barutçu Tekstil, which produced dyed and printed fabrics in 1994-1995, invested in its first weaving loom in 2003. In 2012, with a radical decision, it completely turned towards exports and invested in a dyehouse at the same time. Today, Barutçu Tekstil has turned into a facility with an annual production capacity of 15-18 million metres of fabric with both weaving and dyeing facilities.

We visited the facility of Barutçu Tekstil in Bursa Demirtaş Organised Industrial Zone (DOSAB), which sets new standards in the understanding of fabric, pattern and fashion design with its expert textile and design engineers. We had a special interview with Lütfi Barutçu, Chairman of the Board of Directors of Barutçu Tekstil and İhsan Aktaş, Dyehouse Manager, for our Tekstil Teknoloji magazine. In our interview; we talked about the company’s production activities since its establishment, export markets, R&D activities, projects and the contributions of the machines belonging to the THEN brand within the world-famous German machinery manufacturer Fong’s Europe to Barutçu Tekstil.

“We Dye 15-20 Tonnes of Fabric Per Day”

Can you give information about the size of your facility, the number of employees, the products in your portfolio and your production volume?

Lütfi Barutçu: As Barutçu Tekstil, we have production facilities in 3 different locations. In one of our facilities; knitting and weaving, in the second one; only weaving and in the third one; dyeing and printing are carried out. We produce approximately 15 million metres of fabric in our facility built on a total closed area of 35.000 m2 in Bursa Demirtaş Organised Industrial Zone. In our facility with dobby and jacquard weaving machines; we produce high quality fabrics with a sales average of 5,5-6 Euro/mt.

The capacity of our dyeing facility, which is suitable for woven and knitted fabrics, varies between 15-20 tonnes per day depending on the fabric type.  We can dye all kinds of fibres and fibre blends with and without lycra in our dyehouse. With our digital and rotary printing parks, we are able to dye and print various fabrics obtained from natural and synthetic fibres such as cotton, tencel, modal, lyocell, linen, viscose, polyester, acetate, nylon and silk and their blends in the field of fancy fabrics. We have a total of 420 employees in our three factories.

“We Produce High Quality Products and Export to 42 Countries”

Which are your export markets and which new markets do you see potential in the near future?

Lütfi Barutçu: Since the fabrics we produce are expensive, our export markets consist of countries with high purchasing power such as America, England, Italy, Spain and France. We export to 42 countries worldwide. America is the country where we have much bigger targets. Our trade with the American market is increasing every passing day. Our customers include world-famous brands such as Louis Vuitton, Hugo Boss, Lacoste, GAP, Banana Republic, Tommy Hilfiger and Sandro. In Turkey, we work with brands such as Beymen, Vakko, İpekyol, Fabrika and Koton.

When we visited your facilities, we saw that you have 4 different production lines: weaving, knitting, dyeing and printing. How many machines are there in your parks?

 İhsan Aktaş: We have 184 dobby weaving looms and 16 jacquard weaving machines in our weaving park. We have 30 twisting machines and technological warping machines in our twisting department, which we established to process the yarn we import. In our printing department; we have 3 items 24 head, 1item 16 head paper printing machines and 1 item rotary printing machine. In addition, we have 1 more digital printing machine, which we have recently invested in. Barutçu Tekstil was the first company to buy this machine in Bursa. We prepared a very nice collection with the machine and was a made hit.

“We Invest in Active Wear and Seamless to Build Our Own Brand”

You said that you have started a new investment process in the knitting department? Can we hear the details from you?

Lütfi Barutçu: We have started a new investment process related to knitting. The most important reason for this decision is that global brands in the world see Turkey as a subcontractor. As Barutçu Tekstil, we are making investments to create our own brand especially in the field of ‘Active Wear’ and to become a preferred brand in the international market. In this direction, we have completed the construction of our new knitting factory. We have purchased 20 items knitting machines in the range of 40 to 44 gauge in our knitting department, these machines have been installed and started to work. Our investments will continue in May, September and November and we will increase the number of machines to 70 by the end of 2025. In addition to ‘active wear’, we will also have seamless investments. We plan to sell these products in chain stores and especially in America.

“With THEN’s Air-Jet and Water-Jet Machines, We Can Dye Our Products Perfectly”

We believe that your dye-finishing department (dyehouse) is of great importance in your production and product quality. What do you pay the most attention to when making machinery and technology investments in your production facility?

İhsan Aktaş: We have a very special and different structure in the dyehouse. Therefore, it would not be right to talk only about the number of dyeing machines. As Barutçu Tekstil, we do not produce anything standardised. There are products that we make by using and mixing all the fibres produced in the world. Therefore, we need to have a dyehouse where we can dye these products. We used the machines of many different brands to dye our products, we tried many of them, but we made our investments mostly in FONG’s and THEN machines. Both the air-jet and water-jet machines of this company can dye our products flawlessly and in a way that meets their standards. For this reason, we changed our machines of different brands in our facility and integrated THEN and FONG’s machines instead. We have 30 dyeing machines in our facility. These include jigger, air-jet, water-jet drum, water-jet flat and finally, the winchless dyeing machines and sample machines that we have invested in.

We have 4 stenter machines. One of them is used for open width adjustment. One of our stenter machines has 12 chambers, one has 10 chambers and one has 8 chambers. In order to increase the stenter capacity and reduce energy consumption, we have a new free drying machine. This machine saves energy by 25%. Finally, we have renewed and revised our existing open width washing machine. In our facility where we have 12 quality control machines; we have a group of machines such as setting, steam, brushing, shearing, raising, sanding, emerizing, decatizing, sanforising, calender where we can give additional touch and effect to fabrics.

What were the factors that made you prefer THEN technologies? Can you tell us about the beginning of your co-operation?

Lütfi Barutçu: When we decided to establish the first dyehouse, we started to research the machines we would invest in with our consultant friends. In this process, we met with FONG’S company and THEN brand. We contacted Mehmet Özcan from ITEKS Company, which represents the brand in Turkey. Since we do not have a dyehouse background, Mehmet Bey guided us, his approach to us was very good. He did not say ‘how many machines do you want, let’s send them immediately’. First of all, he listened to us, asked us what we wanted to do, we talked for a long time. Then he told us the suitable machines and this is how we made our first investment. The team of Fong´s Europe GmbH and Mr. Mehmet Özcan always stood behind the machines they sold, they showed great interest until the installation was completed and in the following process. Their technologists and teams constantly visited our facility. Our first investments were in water jet machines, then we thought that we should buy a air-jet machine and we knocked on the door of Fong´s Europe and ITEKS again. We bought one THEN air-jet machine, one machine of a competitor company and one domestic machine. We installed and operated all three machines, we made many trials. When we saw that we got the best results from THEN, we eliminated the other two machines and invested in THEN.

What are the challenges encountered from the Dyeing and Finishing processes? What kind of advantages did Then machines provide you in this regard?

İhsan Aktaş: Problems that may generally occur during dyeing processes, depending on the fabric contents we produce; There are crushs, chafe, openings, fabric width, crease marks, abrasion marks. These problems vary depending on the type of fabric. Depending on the fabric content, THEN machines minimize these problems. If you are dyeing viscose fabric, you will not experience major problems caused by the machine. But if you are dyeing Tencel fabric, the rubbing occurs a little more. THEN machines produce much more successful results due to reasons such as their inverter systems, layout, winch, and the distance is higher than the level.

The second advantage of THEN machines is; touch quality. When we dye fabrics that require fibrillation, such as tencel and modal, THEN machines distinguish themselves with the touch quality we call the peach fuzz effect obtained as a result of fibrillation.

It is worth saying this: You cannot buy quality unexpensive, but since THEN machines have a low waste rate, it is also very advantageous in terms of cost. If we make a calculation like this: Let’s consider the production of a tencel fabric with a weight of 1000 meters. With our quality control standards, while our wastage rate is between 7-8% in other machines, this rate is between 2-3% in THEN machines. There is a 5% difference between the two machines. If the average price per meter of the product we produce is 5 euros, 1000 meters of fabric equals 5 thousand euros. 5% of this equals 250 euros. If we multiply this by our 1-year production, we can say this; We may have depreciated most of our machine within 1 year. While we invested in quality, we actually increased our competitiveness by making our production unexpensive. If we had made these products with other machines, they would have cost more. In short, we experience quality and comfort together in the fabrics we produce with THEN machines.

Can you give information about your investments in THEN machines?

İhsan Aktaş: We have 5 THEN dye machines in our dyehouse. After the ITMA 2023 Fair we last attended, we bought two machines from THEN; One is a winchless machine and the other is a new generation air-jet machine, AIR-JET WIN. Another company other than us uses this machine in Turkey. We set up the machine 1.5 months ago and we continue to test it. We are pleased with the results we have received so far. We are experimenting with acetate knitted fabric, which even FONG’s has not tried before. Acetate is a very different fiber. The results we got are so good, even FONG’S might be surprised by the results.

We also bought a machine winchless from THEN brand. We dye different fibers and their mixtures such as acetate, tencel and nylon. We thought that a winchless machine would make a difference when dyeing these fibers and produce more successful results, so we invested in this machine. As a result of our experiments, we saw that we made the right decision.

We have 14 FONG’S ECO-88 and ECO-8 machines, these machines appeal to our knitting group, we can dye our products such as acetate, floss, nylon, modal and tencel knitted products. In our air-jet machines; We can dye fibers such as flush, tencel, lyocell and modal.

You have an environmentally friendly policy. Do THEN machines comply with your environmental policy in this regard?

İhsan Aktaş: THEN machines exactly match our sensitivity towards the environment. When we look at water usage; The machine winchless is actually a water machine. While the fabric is dyed with 1/10 liquor ratio in flat machines, this ratio decreases to 1/5 or 1/4 liquor in winchless machines. Of course, these rates vary depending on the type of fabric and the loading amount. The liquor ratio in pneumatic machines is; It varies between 1/3 and 1/5.

The liquor ratios of THEN machines are quite low. You can dye with 1/4 or 1/5 liquor ratios. Considering that dyeing was done with 1/20 liquor ratios in the past, this is a very good ratio. In other words, water consumption has reached its lowest level. When water consumption decreases, the chemicals you use decrease and your waste decreases. If we evaluate it in terms of energy consumption; When we dye with 1/12 liquor, there is a big difference between heating 2.5-3 tons of water and heating 1 ton of water. Therefore, we achieved significant energy savings.

Does THEN make technological updates according to your demands? How do they approach your needs and demands?

Lütfi Barutçu: Our communication with FONG’S and THEN team is very strong, we form partnerships together. We can easily reach them whenever we call, they bring manufacturers to our facility and have them tested. They approach us positively when we have any requests regarding the machine, and they try to solve the problem with their R&D and P&D teams. They do machine updates regularly.

We also consult on the issues we want to improve regarding the machine and generally receive positive feedback. For example, we had previously said that we predicted that we could get better results on the fabrics to be dyed if the amount of water pumped from the nozzles for tencel fabrics was increased. An update has been made regarding this in their new air-jet machines and we see that they attach importance to this idea. Because the rear nozzle and front nozzle have been added to the new air-jet machine, allowing the fabric to be dyed with more water while passing through the nozzles.

THEN also allows us to make any changes we want to the machine. For example, we use our own software on the machines. For this reason, if we establish a dyehouse again in the future, we will purchase machines from FONG’s and THEN again.

“We Reach THEN’s Technical Team Every Time We Call and They Solve Our Problems Quickly”

Can you evaluate THEN regarding its after-sales services?

İhsan Aktaş: THEN machines do not cause too many problems. But when we have any problems, we immediately find a contact person. If it is not a problem that can be solved over the phone, the team gets on the plane and comes immediately and our problem is solved in a short time. During the machine installation, our technologist friends from THEN hold meetings with our team and give us both practical and technical training about the machine. Our planning department, business manager, recipe team, maintenance team and all employees involved in the finishing process attend these trainings and learn the machine down to the smallest detail. We also carry out our machine maintenance on a weekly and monthly basis.

We know that you have investments in Solar Energy systems. What stage are you at with this?

Lütfi Barutçu: My son is also a mechanical engineer. When he started working in our company, he wanted to take responsibility for the project related to solar energy systems. Thanks to the incentives we received from the government, we had solar energy panels installed on all 3 of our factories. We meet 18-20% of our energy consumption from these panels. We are installing solar energy systems on our 125,000 m2 land in Konya. When our project is completed, we will be able to provide the energy in all our factories ourselves and also produce clean energy.

Can you give brief information about your goals and projects for 2024?

Lütfi Barutçu: As Barutçu Tekstil, we will continue to invest and pursue quality in whatever direction fashion evolves. We aim to increase the number of our personnel to 600. We are planning to build an additional facility to our current dyehouse. We plan to complete this investment in 2024-2025.

In addition, we will have a new investment related to technical textiles, which will be established on an area of 35,000 m² in Bursa Technology Organized Industrial Zone (TEKNOSAB) in 2025. For this purpose, we have a total investment target of 80-85 million euros. If we find sufficient financing, we will start construction work. We are working with Aachen University in Germany on this project. In our technical textile production facility, we plan to produce carbon fabric used in construction, airports and highways with our expert team of 70 people. We will not only invest in this project, we will also have our personnel training done abroad.