World leading industrial thread and consumer textile crafts business, Coats plc has launched Coats Colour Express – a revolutionary web-based service that provides the apparel and footwear industry with the world’s fastest and most colour accurate sampling facility for industrial sewing thread.

This unrivalled service offers customers a tool to help them select a precisely matched colour sample thread for their needs. It is the only truly integrated thread sampling service that connects brands, retailers and manufacturers online with Coats sales teams, laboratories and production facilities.

Coats matches the thread to the fabric using the revolutionary Coats Colour CAPSURE device.  The CAPSURE uses a one-click colour matching system that accurately identifies colour components present in any material and matches them in seconds to a colour in Coats extensive database of more than 14,000 shades, which is pre-loaded in the CAPSURE device given to customers.

The sample order is then digitally transferred to our network of colour labs.  The lab uses the electronic data to generate colour and immediately start sample production.  All the sample details will be stored in the individual clients’ Coats Colour Express account.

If the colour does not already exist in our database, a dedicated Coats Field Colour Expert can help with colour selection.  Equipped with a Mobile Colour Reader – the latest innovative technology in colour management – our experts can analyse any fabric, create a perfectly matched thread colour and digitally transfer the results to the nearest lab for production.

Frazer Smith, Chief Commercial Officer, Coats plc, said: ‘Coats Colour Express was developed in response to customer feedback and our own research which found that customers were finding it difficult to match the thread colour to their samples and turnaround time was too slow. In response, we developed the fastest and most colour accurate thread sampling service in the world, reducing the lead time for thread samples from up to 10 days to between two and three.  Customers wanted fast, accurate colour and that is what we have delivered.’

Colour Express is currently available in nine countries including China, Turkey, Egypt, Sri Lanka, Indonesia, Pakistan, Bangladesh, India and Vietnam and is being implemented throughout the UK, Europe and Latin America in the next three months, then rolled out across the rest of the world during 2013.

To download a high resolution image for Coats Colour Express go to: www.coats.com/imagelibrary

To find out more about Coats Colour Express go to: www.coatscolourexpress.com

ENDS