Custom cut-and-sew apparel can be a powerful differentiator for brands. But lengthy production timelines, minimum-quantity requirements and other factors often stall out such projects before they can truly get started.

The Overlook puffer jacket can be custom designed on demand in quantities as low as one piece.

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Rupt (asi/84203) aims to remove those potential snags with its newly launched on-demand cut-and-sew program, allowing distributors to order one-piece minimum custom outerwear and shoes that can be created in seven days and shipped worldwide.

“We’re not decorating inventory on demand,” CEO Jason Lucash told Counselor. “We’re actually making the product on demand.”

The seeds for the new program were planted last year, after custom outerwear supplier Hexa Custom shut down amid tariff-related production disruptions, Lucash said. “Over and over again, people were basically telling us, ‘Someone needs to fill that gap,’” he added.

With many in the industry viewing Lucash and Rupt co-founder Mike Szymczak as the “on-demand guys,” Lucash decided they were the right team to pick up where Hexa left off, building a similar online customizer experience and cut-and-sew product line, but “with way more sprinkles and glitter on it.”

It took about a year to set up the infrastructure and operations to support cut-and-sew in Rupt’s facility in Asia. At the same time, Lucash added, Rupt invested “a ton of money” building a new front-end online apparel customizer, which allows designers to create everything from a color-blocked puffer jacket to an allover-print windbreaker. Rupt also offers several shoe styles that can be fully customized, with a one-pair minimum.

The Brker windbreaker from Rupt can be cut and sewn with an allover custom digital design.

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Once products have been designed, Rupt’s team can use AI-enabled technology to render the products on models and create realistic-looking videos of the custom jackets being sewn or a person walking in a pair of custom shoes – all before a single piece has been created in the factory, Lucash said. Distributors can use the imagery to build enticing company stores, with pieces only cut and sewn once individual orders are placed.

Rupt keeps the on-demand production affordable by ganging designs together, which are dye sublimated onto huge rolls of fabric, then laser-cut piece by piece on a plotter and sorted into bins to be sewn. “It’s a volume play,” Lucash said. “On any given day, our factory could be doing 300 jackets. It could be 300 jackets for the same company or 300 individual designs.”

There’s also a strong sustainability angle to the on-demand production, since brands no longer need to make a huge inventory commitment, involving emissions-heavy freight shipments, to create a custom apparel program, Lucash said. Plus, they don’t have to guess on sizing, which also cuts down on waste. Rupt, which launched in 2024, has made sustainability a key focus of its company, publishing product-level emissions and offsetting carbon impact for every product. The supplier also employs “second-life packaging,” with boxes designed to be transformed into things like phone stands, bird feeders, spice racks or other everyday objects after shipping.

Rupt launched the on-demand cut-and-sew program on Tuesday, Aug. 18, via a webinar for around 700 customers. The following day, Lucash said, the supplier was already fielding hundreds of orders.

“The response for this has been bananas,” Lucash said.

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