NEW YORK, New York—Covington Fabric & Design LLC is among the first to offer  higher end 200 color digital prints in its Heirloom line at Showtime featuring its own designs just in time for the continued uptick in the print business.

Covington Classics with reinterpreted archival prints and Simply Covington with a geometric component are the two collections being shown at Showtime in June.

The digital portion of the print collection follows President   & CEO’s Greg Tarver’s strategy to utilize the latest technology in Covington’s business plan, a plan that has already earned the company the title of “the comeback kid.” “Digital printing is becoming more of a force and it won’t be a mistake not to push it forward,” Tarver said. “We’ve taken digital printing to the converter tier and that means very aggressive pricing.” Covington Digital Fabrics

After being down for several years, the new ownership has turned the veteran converter around. In fact, Covington just celebrated its best first quarter since new ownership bought it in 2008 according to Tarver who has been running the business since 2011 for the owners.  “They have provided me with a lot of latitude to try new things. “We’re one third ahead of our aggressive business plan this year,” Tarver explained gleefully. He has spent more than three decades in the textile industry, most recently as President of the Robert Allen Group and before that, with WestPoint Stevens.

Covington Digital Fabrics

“The business is coming from all areas but if I had to rank the increase by segment it would be contract first, followed by chain, jobber, furniture manufacturer, soft line manufacturers retail and export,” he said in addition to the new digital collection from Heirloom. He’s building on Covington’s strengths, especially in its extensive design archive for newly colored prints. Simply Covington will feature transitional prints at Showtime. Special 55/45 linen and viscose prints cloths will be the base cloth for the digital collection. “The cost parity of digital printing versus conventional printing has become more compelling each year when you consider the cost of screens and printing lead-time,” Tarver remarked.” The minimum order is 50 yards for the digital collection, he said.

 Covington Industries was purchased by The Kahan and Rifkin families when it was believed to be a nonprofit organization and though private, it is understood that Covington is now profitable again but nobody would confirm this if you asked them, Tarver agreed. Mark Kahan, Chairman, told F&FI “the Covington brand has been around for over 70 years and throughout that time has built a great reputation. While the company experienced challenges after the Gilmore’s sold it, we believed in the brand and saw an opportunity to help bring it back.”

The turnaround has been led by more attention being paid to the contract trade, Tarver said, under the leadership of Craig Shirk, Vice President of Contract Sales and with the company since the 80’s. Tarver said that Shirk has instituted a consistent sales and new product effort and new colorations in the line.  Under Shirk, Covington has doubled its contract sales force, Tarver said. “Contract was left to wither on the vine so it needed someone like Craig to pay attention to it and make it grow again,” Tarver explained. This division has also seen what Tarver calls “phenomenal results” in new sheers and blackout linings. Covington sells direct to the contract market with new product brought out every four months, Tarver said.

In residential sales, Covington has seen interest in lifestyle marketing of its lines in three themes: Country/Southern Living and Menswear. “The customer knows what to expect from us and so does our sales force. Covington’s recently introduced outdoor fabric collection was considered to be the best received new program in 20 years according to veteran Covington salesmen. The line is made on a polyester warp with a solution dyed polypropylene weft, Tarver said and made in North America.

The other area of growth for the company has been in China where Covington Trading Company was established in 2009. “We’re able to do business in RMB for China to China selling,” Tarver explained, for our furniture and pillow programs. We’re also making some sales to the domestic China market.”

Covington has reduced the number of mills it works within China in order to produce comparable quality to what is made in the USA. Most of what Covington sells today is delivered from stock within two days of receipt of order from its Calhoun Falls, SC warehouse, Tarver said. “Of course, some large container orders are drop shipped directly to the customer from China, which is an increasing part of our business,” he added.