Fast Fashion

In an interesting countertrend, fashion retailers are increasingly turning to domestic production to take advantage of the faster turnaround times and more flexibility.

"U.S. retailers are finally looking at lost sales as lost revenue," said Cohen. "They know that in order to capture maximum sales they need to turn their inventory much quicker." The disadvantage of importing from China, he said, is that it requires a longer lead time of between three to six month from the time an order is placed to when the inventory is stocked in stores.

"By then the trends may have changed and you're stuck with all the unsold inventory," he said. "If retailers want to refresh their merchandise quicker, they will have to consider sourcing at least some of the merchandise locally."

I like to see domestic producers doing well. But I also like to see them doing well because they are exploiting their competitive advantage as opposed to hobbling overseas manufacturers with quotas.