Quick answer: Similar fabrics can have different prices because of differences in fibre quality, manufacturing, certifications, production scale, shipping, and the way they reach the market. Two fabrics may look alike, but the journey behind each one, and the costs involved, can be very different...
Two bolts of cotton jersey: one is $12 per metre while the other is $30. They look almost identical on the shelf, so why don't they cost the same?
It's a question we get asked fairly often, and we'd love to shine a little light on how fabric pricing actually works. Before we get in, we want to be clear: we're not trying to speak for the textile industry as a whole, or suggest that every expensive fabric is automatically better than every inexpensive one. This is simply our experience as one fabric store. As we head into our fifth year in business, we've made our fair share of mistakes, learned a great deal along the way, and gained a much deeper appreciation for everything that goes into a single metre of fabric. Our hope is simply to share some of what we've learned so the next time you're standing in front of two very similar-looking fabrics with very different price tags, you'll have a better sense of what might explain the difference.
Before it's a bolt on our shelf, and well before it becomes a dress, a quilt, or a pair of pajamas, every fabric has a story. Let's follow one from the beginning.
Every fabric starts as a fibre. If it's cotton, it began as a plant grown, harvested, and cleaned before it's ready to be spun. Linen begins as flax, wool comes from sheep, and silk is grown in silkworm cocoons. Polyester and nylon follow a very different path, manufactured from petroleum-based raw materials. Semi-synthetics like viscose and lyocell, on the other hand, land somewhere in between; produced from natural materials like wood pulp, but extruded and spun into fibres using chemical and industrial processes.
This is where the price journey begins. Many raw fibres are traded as commodities, meaning their prices rise and fall with supply and demand. A poor cotton harvest, changing oil prices, geopolitical events, tariffs, trade policies, or shifts in global demand can all affect what manufacturers pay before they've even started production. This means the cost of the raw materials used to spin the yarn and weave the fabric can rise and fall many times over the course of a single year.
And of course, certain materials have a higher cost. Silk, wool, and linen are more expensive because they are labour-intensive to produce; organic cotton costs more because it is more expensive to grow and has smaller yields compared to traditional cotton. Modal and Tencel fibres cost more than generic rayon due to the closed-loop solvent process used to create them.
From there, our fibre usually travels. It might be spun into yarn in one facility, knitted or woven into fabric somewhere else, then dyed and finished at another mill entirely. Sometimes those steps happen in one country, but often they do not. At every stage, skilled people are doing highly specialized work including spinning, knitting, weaving, dyeing, finishing, inspecting, and testing.
We care deeply about the conditions those people work in. Since we can't personally inspect mills halfway around the world, we rely on independent certifications whenever possible.
Different certifications (read more about them here) assess different parts of the process. GOTS (Global Organic Textile Standard), for example, covers organic fibre production alongside environmental and social criteria throughout manufacturing. OEKO-TEX® Standard 100 tests the finished textile itself for harmful substances, while other certifications focus specifically on auditing manufacturing facilities and labour practices. None of these overlap completely, but each one represents real investment, auditing, and accountability on the mill's part, as there are high costs with maintaining certifications.
Environmental practices matter just as much here. Dyeing and finishing are among the most resource-intensive parts of textile production, using significant amounts of water and energy. Some mills invest heavily in treating wastewater responsibly, managing chemicals carefully, and adopting cleaner production methods, all of which add real, measurable cost. Others won’t invest and will keep costs down, and the difference tends to show up in the surrounding environment and community rather than on any invoice to a client.
Where production happens affects pricing too. Wages, electricity costs, rent, taxes, currency exchange, and local regulations all shift from one region to the next, which means different countries producing the same fabric may charge widely different prices.
Two midweight cotton jerseys can both say "95% cotton, 5% elastane" and be worlds apart. A lot of that difference is in the yarn; longer-staple cotton pills less, and when it's ring-spun, it's strong and soft, but both cost more than short-staple, open-spun yarn. To save cost, a mill might weave a looser fabric, rather than a denser fabric that holds its shape and lasts longer. Cheap elastane loses its ability to recover much sooner, while a properly fixed dye holds colour for years instead of fading in ten washes. Some differences are obvious the moment you touch the fabric, while others only reveal themselves after you've sewn and washed a garment a few times.
Production scale also plays a surprisingly large role. A mill producing hundreds of thousands of metres can manufacture fabric far more efficiently than one producing small specialty runs. Larger production volumes spread fixed costs across more fabric, lowering the cost per metre. Smaller runs, premium fibres, stricter quality control, or more complex finishing processes all tend to increase costs.
This is why price alone isn't a perfect indicator of quality. An expensive fabric isn't automatically better, and an affordable fabric isn't automatically inferior. Sometimes you're paying for better materials or manufacturing, sometimes for certifications or small runs, sometimes just for branding. Usually it's a mix of all three.
Once the fabric leaves the mill, it often has a long way to travel. International freight, customs, brokerage fees, and insurance are a huge part of the total fabric cost, well before it reaches our warehouse. Fabric is heavy and bulky, which makes shipping genuinely expensive; a roll of denim weighs several times as much as a roll of poplin or viscose, so transportation costs vary widely by fabric type. On average, we pay anywhere from $1 to $5 per metre to ship fabric from around the world, and that range isn't fixed: tariffs, port congestion, fuel prices, and shifting trade policy can all push it higher with little warning.
Once it reaches us, fabric needs somewhere to live, and somewhere isn't free. Climate-controlled storage, inventory systems, insurance, and warehouse space cost money for as long as that fabric sits on our shelves. In addition, we often pay for fabric months before it actually arrives, and every month it sits unsold after that means we're carrying the cost with nothing coming back. If we guess wrong on how fast fabric will sell, we risk tying up limited cash flow or even losing money on that investment.
By now, it’s clear that every fabric has its own journey. Deadstock fabrics are a reminder that sometimes a fabric’s story has already begun long before it reaches us. Some fabrics were originally produced for fashion brands or manufacturers but for one reason or another, never became the garments they were intended to be. (We've explored deadstock in more detail in this other post).
What makes deadstock different is that by the time it reaches a fabric store like ours, much of that journey has already happened. The fabric has been produced and paid for, but is waiting for a new life since it no longer fits the original buyer's plans. That gives us the opportunity to purchase great fabrics at a lower cost than newly produced alternatives, and in turn offer them to you at a more accessible price. This is why you may see price differences among similar fabrics in our shop: a deadstock knit may have cost us less to purchase than a similar knit we had produced in a mill, and we pass those savings on to you.
There's an environmental benefit, too. While choosing deadstock doesn't erase the resources that went into making the fabric in the first place, it does help make better use of material that already exists by giving it another opportunity to be used and enjoyed.
This is where the story becomes personal. Unlike most retail products, fabric doesn't arrive ready to box up and ship to you. Every order is measured, inspected, cut, folded, and packed by hand by our team.
Behind the scenes, we're also maintaining our website, photographing fabrics, writing product descriptions, managing inventory, and helping customers choose the right fabric for their projects. Those conversations about fibre content, drape, stretch, care instructions, or whether a fabric will actually work for what you're making are some of our favourite parts of the job. They're also part of what you're supporting when you shop with us.
Buying fabric is a bet, and not every bet pays off - some fabric doesn't sell, and some sells at a loss. When it does sell at full price, here's what happens to the revenue once the original cost is subtracted out (every retailer's numbers will look different, but this is roughly how it breaks down for us at Core Fabrics):
25% Payroll (fulfilment, customer service, buying, marketing, sales, and management)
20% Investment in new inventory
15% Shipping and freight
15% E-commerce management and contractors (web development, professional, photography, advertising, software)
12% Rent, utilities, and office expenses
8% Servicing business debt
5% Buffer
By the time a metre of fabric reaches your sewing table, most of what's left after the initial cost of purchasing has already been reinvested into everything required to bring it to you. What's left over as actual profit is a sliver of that 5% buffer, if there's anything left at all.
By now, you've seen that a metre of fabric is more than what's written in the description, but a result of hundreds of decisions made along the way. Some fabrics take a different path than others, and that's often why they carry a different price. What comes next, and what that fabric will now become, is up to you...
If you'd like to dig deeper into where textiles come from, how they're made, and the challenges shaping the industry, these are a few resources we return to:
Emmanuelle
Emmanuelle is in charge of our marketing department and is voice behind our product descriptions, newsletters, videos, social posts, and blog. If there’s a textile pun to be made, she’ll find it.
