How to Verify a Bangladeshi Garment Factory Is Real

Start with the public databases

Three sources cover most of the Bangladeshi export sector, and all three are free to search. A factory that appears in none of them is not necessarily fake, but it is unaudited, and that is a different risk profile than most buyers think they are taking.

• The RSC (RMG Sustainability Council) publishes the successor register to the Accord and Alliance safety programmes, covering structural, fire and electrical remediation status for participating factories.
• amfori BSCI participants can be confirmed through the amfori platform. This is the social-compliance audit most Bangladeshi export factories hold, and the one we hold.
• The BGMEA (Bangladesh Garment Manufacturers and Exporters Association) member directory confirms a company is a registered exporter with a factory address, which is the baseline.
• The Open Supply Hub aggregates factory disclosure lists published by major brands. If a factory supplies anyone who publishes their supplier list, it will appear with a mapped address.

Match the names, not just the certificates

The single most common way a certificate misleads is that it is genuine but belongs to somebody else. A trading company can send you a real BSCI certificate for a factory it sometimes uses, and nothing about the document is forged.

So check three names against each other: the company on the quotation, the company on the audit certificate, and the company on the proforma invoice you would be wiring money to. If any of the three differ, that is a question, not necessarily a problem — subcontracting and separate trading entities are both normal. But it should be explained before you pay a deposit, not after.

Check the address the same way. An audit certificate names a facility address. It should match the address on the quotation and the place in the video you are shown.

What a genuine factory video actually shows

Ask for a live walkthrough at a time you nominate, not a file. The difference between live and recorded is the entire point of the exercise: a recording proves a factory exists somewhere, and a live call at 11am on a Tuesday you chose proves this supplier has access to it right now.

On the call, the things worth watching for are ordinary rather than dramatic.

• Signage matching the company name, at the entrance and on the floor
• Sewing lines running with operators at them, not an empty hall
• Work in progress on the tables — bundles, tickets, part-finished garments
• The specific process you are buying. Ask to see knitting, or the print carousel, or the embroidery heads
• A QC table with rejects on it. A floor with no rejects visible is a floor that has been staged
• Fire exits, marked and unobstructed, and the certification board most audited factories keep near reception

Run these checks on us as well as anyone else. We hold BSCI and nothing else — no WRAP, no OEKO-TEX, no GOTS, no ISO — and we would rather state that plainly than let you discover it at audit, which is why it is written out on our certifications page.

The questions that separate real from relayed

Verification is not only about the building. It is about whether the person quoting you understands the product. Four questions do most of the work.

• "Which of these processes happen in this building?" A factory answers with a precise split. Anyone answering "everything" about knitting, dyeing, printing, embroidery, washing and finishing is either exceptional or not answering.
• "What GSM do you recommend for this and why?" A technical answer that mentions shrinkage, twist or hand-feel comes from someone who has made the garment. A number with no reasoning came from a price list.
• "What is your AQL standard and can I see a past inspection report?" AQL 2.5 with a photo report is the normal export answer. Vagueness here is the strongest single signal.
• "What can you not do?" This is the most useful question on the list. Every real factory has a clear answer — a category it does not make, a certificate it does not hold, a minimum it cannot go below. A supplier with no limitations has not told you where they are.

Red flags worth walking away from

• A refusal to do a live video call at a time you choose, with any explanation.
• A certificate naming a different company or address than the quotation, unexplained.
• Payment requested to a personal account, or to a company in a different country than the factory, without a stated reason.
• A quote far below the market. Bangladeshi export tees do not cost $3 CIF. A price that good is a fabric substitution you have not been told about yet.
• Claimed certifications across the board — WRAP and OEKO-TEX and GOTS and BSCI and ISO. Mill-level certificates like OEKO-TEX and GOTS belong to fabric suppliers, not sewing factories, and a factory claiming all of them is claiming things it cannot produce at audit.
• A duty-free guarantee for EU or UK import. That preference needs a registered proof of origin, and a supplier promising it should be able to name the registration. Many cannot, including us — we are not REX registered and we say so.
• Pressure to skip the sample. The sample is the only part of this process that proves anything.

The one check that matters most

If you do only one thing, order a sample and pay for it. It costs USD 60 for a blank or USD 85 with branding, plus around USD 45 shipping, and with us it is credited back against the bulk order. It tells you what no database can: whether this supplier can actually make your garment, how long they take, how they communicate under a deadline, and what they do when you send revisions.

Every buyer who has been badly burned skipped that step. Every database check on this page is worth doing, and none of them substitutes for holding the garment.