La gestión del diseño en las empresas manufactureras de indumentaria en denim

Abstract

Nowadays, companies put a great emphasis in the design, as an important strategic active in order to reach competitive and differentiator advantages facing a market with a big growth of products and consumers that wish to enhance their quality life with products that fit their necessities. It is required for new, creative, innovative approaches, that the design can implement, allowing to a businessmen’ reflection about the way they work with the design inside their companies. The awareness about incorporating design through time and in different contexts, which some worldwide companies adopt, mainly in developing countries, open doors to the development of new products. The technology transference, the emergence of the new market poles and the consumption bring new customers. In order to achieve changes, it is required to generate a new thinking in the company, where the same philosophy needs to be transformed; with a wide and flexible vision with actions and proposals of viable changes. Some of them have been presented by government and private organizations, which are international known. These organizations develop tools, plans and measurements in providing a basis for the importance of design in the economy because it has been understood that design management is a part of factors that provides innovation and in the same way to the competitiveness of a country or region. From a local perspective in the productive sector about denim in Pelileo which belongs to Tungurahua province – Ecuador. Because the majority of the entrepreneurships were handmade, businessmen could not comprehend what their situation was regarding the design, which beliefs they have, which pathway can be adopted for improvements and how to adequately handle this source in order to achieve competitive advantages in the market. The objective of the current research is to identify the signals of the integration of the design in a basic level related to high-developed entrepreneurships in the denim sector in Pelileo, which leads to generate a diagnosis model in order to identify the situation of the companies and their integration level with the design. It will define the implications that the design management can contribute in the clothing manufacturing companies in denim. It has been chosen because in this sector, there is a wide business fabric, which is the economic base in the city and it has a wide-ranging in the market at the national level. After applying the case study as the methodology, the research analyses the situation from two approaches: on the one hand, the macro level (country) and on the other hand, the micro level (companies) in order to get an overview from the context in where the companies under study are developing. Having a notion of the political, economic, social, technological, ecological, legal and demographic dynamics that are part of the Ecuadorian reality allowed knowing the opportunities and threats of the companies against their strengths and weaknesses. The obtained results show the factors that support and those that harm the insertion of the design in the companies of the sector as a productive development strategy.