UK textile labelling: what must legally be on the label

Two different things get called “the label rules”, and conflating them is how UK brands either over-engineer a label or leave something off it.

One is a legal requirement about what the garment is made of. The rest are commercial necessities that you will not get onto a shelf without, but which come from a different place.

The legal part: fibre composition

Textile products sold in the UK have to carry fibre composition information, under the UK Textile Products (Labelling and Fibre Composition) Regulations.

The principle is the same one used across most markets: state what the garment is made of, by percentage, by weight, in descending order, using recognised fibre names.

So 95% cotton, 5% elastane. Not “cotton rich”, not “premium cotton blend”, and not a trademarked fibre name on its own.

Points that catch people:

• Small percentages still count. The elastane in a stretch tee belongs on the label.
• The name has to be a recognised one. Marketing names are additional, not a substitute.
• Linings, trims and small components are treated differently from the main fabric — worth checking specifically if your garment has anything unusual.

We are a knitwear manufacturer, not a compliance consultancy. The above is the shape of the requirement, not the requirement itself. Regulations are amended, and your product and materials determine what applies. Confirm current requirements with your own testing house or lawyer before you finalise labelling. The obligation sits with whoever places the goods on the UK market — which is you, not a factory abroad.

The commercially essential part

None of these are the same kind of requirement as composition, and all of them are effectively mandatory if you want to sell:

Element	Why it is there
Care symbols	Your customer needs them, and a shrunk garment is a return
Importer or brand details	Retailers require it, and it identifies who is responsible
Size	Obvious, and it needs to match a real measurement chart
Batch or style reference	Makes a problem traceable to a production run
Country of origin	Not always a blanket legal requirement, but expected commercially — and misstating it is a serious problem

Treat this list as required in practice. Just do not confuse it with the composition rule when you are asking a supplier or a lawyer a question, because the answers come from different places.

Care instructions deserve more thought than they get

The practical risk with care labelling is not enforcement. It is that a wrong instruction produces a garment that shrinks, bleeds or pills in the customer’s machine, and the return lands on you.

Care instructions should follow from the actual fabric and finishing, not be copied from a similar garment. Ask your factory directly: are these based on the fabric you are actually knitting, or lifted from a previous style? A compacted, pre-shrunk 100% cotton jersey and an uncompacted one need different advice, and only one of them survives a hot wash.

Children’s wear carries more

Everything above, plus a set of safety obligations that adult garments do not have — cords and drawstrings, small parts, traceability. What the cord standard covers is the one most often missed at design stage, and the wider children’s wear questions cover the rest.

Origin, and why it is worth getting right

Country of origin is where a garment was made — for one cut and sewn in India, that is India.

The rules on what counts as origin when production crosses several countries are genuinely complicated, and they are your customs broker’s territory rather than a factory’s. If your fabric comes from one country and assembly happens in another, ask them specifically rather than assuming the answer.

It matters commercially as well as legally, because origin drives your tariff position and any preference claim. A wrong origin statement is not a labelling problem, it is a customs problem.

Get it applied in the factory

This is the practical part that saves real money.

If labelling is applied at the factory, goods arrive ready for your shelf or your 3PL. If it is not, somebody relabels every unit in a warehouse — and that cost never appears in the quote you compared, which is exactly why a cheaper-looking quote sometimes is not.

Ask a supplier:

1. Do you apply UK-market labelling in the factory?
2. Can you produce label artwork to my specification?
3. What fibre composition will you state, and does it match the yarn you are actually using?
4. Are the care instructions derived from this fabric?
5. Can you supply the documentation my customs broker will want?

A supplier who already ships to the UK will have answered these before, and that experience is worth something — which is part of what to establish when choosing a manufacturer.

The last chance to catch an error

A pre-shipment inspection checks labelling and packing alongside workmanship and measurements. That is the final point at which a labelling mistake is still the factory’s problem rather than a warehouse full of your problem — one of several reasons an AQL inspection earns its cost on a first order.

---

We apply UK-market labelling in our unit in Tirupur — fibre composition, care symbols in English, your importer details and size labels — so consignments arrive ready for the shelf. We supply UK brands and wholesalers from 300 pieces per style per colour. Send us your label artwork and we will tell you what we need to produce it.