Who pays the factory?

You do, directly, wherever it is practical. Money moving from buyer to factory keeps us an agent rather than a principal holding your funds, which is better for you and removes an obvious conflict. Where a payment has to route through us, it is stated in writing before it happens, with the amount, the reason and the reconciliation.

Is your commission on top of the factory price?

Yes. The factory quotes you for the goods, and our fee is invoiced separately as a service. We are not a hidden margin inside a price you cannot see — which is also why the fee is a percentage you can calculate rather than a markup you have to infer. You see what the factory is paid.

Can I visit the factory?

Yes, and for a first order it is worth doing. We arrange it and attend. If travel is not practical, we visit on your behalf, photograph and measure against the agreed checklist, and send the evidence rather than a summary of it.

What happens if something goes wrong?

Our role is evidence, and evidence is what a dispute runs on. We inspect against a checklist agreed before the order, so a shortfall is documented at the milestone where it occurred rather than discovered at your warehouse. The claim against the factory is yours to make: we are not a party to it and do not take custody of goods, so we cannot be the defendant. What we can do is put your file in order and be available to support it.

How do you choose the factory?

We shortlist from the panel for your product and quantity, with the reasoning written down — what each can do, what each cannot, and what the price difference buys. You choose. The order is placed in your name, with you as the buyer, so the relationship and the pattern belong to you rather than to us.

Do you work with a factory I already use?

Often, yes. If you have a supplier you trust and the problem is specification, inspection or coordination, that is the same work and there is no reason to move. We will be direct if the factory cannot hold the specification you need — that is a finding, not a sales objection.

Do you handle freight and customs?

We coordinate, and we do not act as a licensed freight forwarder or a customs broker. Your forwarder moves your goods and your broker clears them. Where you do not have one, we introduce the ones we use and you appoint them directly, so the commercial relationship is yours.

What is the smallest order you will take on?

It depends on the product, because factory minimums are set by material constraints rather than by our preference. The honest answer is that below roughly 300 pieces you are buying sampling rather than production, and if that is what you need we will tell you so rather than take a fee for calling it something else.

Sourcing

Managed production

We run your order with a factory we work with, you approve every stage, and we report what we actually find. What that costs, what it includes, and what it does not promise.

What this is

We run clothing orders in Pakistan: we scope the order, place it in your name, inspect it and report evidence at each milestone. You approve every stage. Our fee is 8–12% of order value on a first engagement, 5–8% on repeat, invoiced as a service.

Who this is for, and who it is not for

The fastest way to waste a month is to start an engagement that was never a fit. So this section exists to talk you out of it if that is the honest answer.

A good fit, and the cases where we are the wrong answer
A good fit	Not a fit — and what to do instead
You have a product in mind and a quantity you can fund, and you need it made properly rather than cheaply.	You need a price today for a garment you have not specified. Write the specification first — this is how.
You want someone accountable between your money and a factory you cannot visit.	You want a name and address to import from and will manage everything else. You do not need a desk for that.
You are in the middle of the quantity range — roughly 300 to 20,000 pieces — where a buyer is too small for the big exporters and too serious for a hobby supplier.	You want under 300 pieces. That is sampling, not production, and a small-batch producer will serve you better and cheaper than we can.
You will make decisions rather than delegate them. You approve the spec, the sample and each milestone.	You want the whole thing handled without being asked anything. Every stage we run needs your approval, so this would be slow and frustrating for both of us.
You are selling into a market with rules you intend to meet — testing, labelling, origin.	You want the cheapest possible garment regardless of what it is made of or how it is labelled. We will not sign that, and someone else will.
Cotton-rich apparel, denim, knitwear, home textiles — the categories Pakistan is genuinely strong in.	Man-made fibre performance wear at volume. China or Vietnam will serve you better and we will say so.

What the engagement includes

Six steps, and nothing hidden behind a project-management layer:

We scope it. You tell us what you want to make. We turn it into a written specification and a cost — fabric, trims, construction, finishing, packing, tolerances, and the tests that will be applied. This document is the thing every quotation is measured against, and it is yours to keep whether or not you proceed.
We place it with a factory, in your name. A shortlist with written reasoning, your choice, and you as the buyer. The factory relationship and the pattern belong to you, not to us, which is what makes leaving us possible.
You pay the factory directly wherever possible. Money moving buyer to factory keeps us an agent rather than a principal holding your funds. Where a payment must route through us it is documented in advance.
We inspect and report at agreed milestones against the checklist agreed before the order — not a checklist invented afterwards. We deliver evidence: photographs, measurements, counts.
You approve or reject each milestone. Release decisions are yours. Nothing proceeds past a milestone you have not signed off.
Our fee is for management and inspection, invoiced as a service. It is a percentage you can calculate, not a markup inside the factory's price that you have to infer.

What it costs

Three bands. Most agents do not publish this, on the theory that a buyer who does not know the price will ask anyway. We publish it because it filters better than a sales call does.

Engagement bands. The fee is invoiced as a service, always separate from the goods.
Band	What it is	What you get	Rate
Advice	A paid call before you commit money	A review of your product, quantity, target cost and timeline; what is realistic in Pakistan; a written summary afterwards	$150–$300 per hour
Managed trial	Your first order run end to end	Specification, factory shortlist and placement, sample round coordination, milestone inspection with evidence, shipment coordination	8–12% of order value
Managed repeat	Subsequent orders, same buyer	The same work, on a specification and supplier relationship that already exist	5–8% of order value

Two things about the fee that are worth being explicit about, because they are where sourcing arrangements usually stop being honest:

We invoice for service, not for goods. Your order value is the factory's, and our fee is separate. You can see both.
We are not paid by the factory. No factory pays for placement, for a favourable shortlist position, or for a better description. If we ever accept payment from the supply side, it will be disclosed on the page where it applies — and today we do not.

What we will not do

This list is checked before anything is published and before any engagement is accepted. It is the more useful half of a promise, and it is the part that costs us work:

We will not call a factory verified, certified or audited. We are not an accreditation body and we do not audit factories. We visit, inspect against an agreed checklist and report what we see. The companies that certify are the ones whose name belongs on a certificate — SGS, Intertek, QIMA — and we are not one of them.
We will not guarantee quality, delivery or price. We do not control the factory's machines, its staffing, or a port's schedule. We warrant our own work and nothing else.
We will not claim to be the best, the cheapest or the largest. Those are unverifiable, and being caught making one costs more than the claim was worth.
We will not take custody of your goods. No warehouse, no consolidation in our name, no inventory we own. It keeps us an agent and keeps your goods yours.
We will not publish a number we cannot source, including on this page. Where a figure is an estimate, the method is stated.
We will not name a client without written permission. No exceptions, including for work we are proud of.

The process, step by step

Who does what, and what you receive at each stage. Timings are typical for a first order and move with the product.
Milestone	Who does what	What you receive
Enquiry	You describe the product and quantity. We answer honestly, including when the answer is no.	A written view on feasibility, and what the specification still needs
Scope	We write the specification and cost structure with you.	A specification document and a cost model you keep
Shortlist	We shortlist factories with written reasoning and indicative pricing.	Two to four candidates, what each is good at, and the price difference
Selection and sampling	You choose. We coordinate the sample round and the corrections.	Physical samples, measurement reports, and a written approved standard
Order placement	You confirm the order and pay the factory. We confirm capacity, materials and dates in writing.	A confirmed order with dates, materials and tolerances on record
In-production checks	We inspect at the agreed points — typically fabric receipt, cutting, and in-line.	Photographs, measurements and counts at each check
Pre-shipment inspection	We inspect the finished goods against the approved standard.	An inspection report you act on: approve, rework, or reject
Shipment	You appoint the forwarder. We coordinate documents and handover.	Packing list, loading evidence, and the documents your broker needs

Why us

A new sourcing desk normally spends years assembling three things: operational capability, supplier relationships, and a trading record that somebody else can corroborate. This desk starts with all three through Al Imran Enterprises.

What the associated company brings, and what it is used for here
Al Imran Enterprises capability	What Kubramal uses it for
Sourcing from overseas principals	Knowing how to qualify a supplier and what a real one looks like
Handling genuineness risk on high-value parts	Process discipline for proving what was actually supplied
Industrial QC expectations	Checklist design — what to measure, not what to glance at
Import and export logistics	Shipment coordination and document discipline
Relationships inside Pakistani textile mills	Fabric and production access
34 years of trading history	A record that can be corroborated independently of us

This is a commercial relationship between two related businesses and it is disclosed as one. The exact basis is common ownership — the same person owns both. It is stated in that form rather than as a vague partnership, because a buyer deciding whether to trust this desk is entitled to know what is behind it.

Editorial independence

Kubramal is an independent editorial and sourcing business. We publish what it actually costs and takes to manufacture clothing in Pakistan, and we run production for buyers who want it done.

We are under common ownership with Al Imran Enterprises, an industrial parts and automation supplier that has served Pakistani industry — including textile mills — for 34 years. That relationship gives us access to established supplier networks and to operational and procurement experience in Pakistan’s industrial sector, which we now apply to apparel.

It does not make Al Imran Enterprises a client, a sponsor, or a subject of favourable coverage. No supplier pays for coverage, ranking or a favourable comparison. Where a commercial relationship could create a conflict of interest, it is disclosed on the page it affects rather than in a policy nobody reads.

What this engagement is not

This is a process engagement, not a guarantee. We warrant our own work — that we scope, place, inspect and report as agreed, and that the evidence we send is what we found. We do not warrant the factory's output, its delivery date, or your commercial outcome, because we do not control them. Disputes with a factory are yours, with our documented evidence supporting them. We never take custody of goods.

Start the conversation

Describe the product and the quantity you have in mind. You will get an honest view on feasibility and cost before anyone is asked to commit anything. Enquiring costs nothing, and the specification we write is yours either way.

Product pricing bands on this page

The rates above are ours and we stand behind them. The per-piece and MOQ figures on the rest of this site are a different kind of number — estimates constructed from sourced inputs and labelled as estimates — and they are explained where they appear. We do not publish a number without saying which kind it is. Start with what a t-shirt costs to make or how MOQ is actually set.