Director of Production Operations – Apparel & Custom Decoration

THE OPPORTUNITY

A growing, privately held organization in the custom apparel, branded merchandise, and fulfillment industry is seeking an experienced Director of Production Operations to lead its production and distribution functions.

This is a highly visible, hands-on leadership opportunity for someone who understands how to run a fast-paced production environment where quality, speed, labor efficiency, equipment uptime, inventory, and customer deadlines all matter.

The successful candidate will oversee daily operations across multiple production processes, including apparel decoration, printing, embroidery, finishing, order fulfillment, and distribution.

This role is ideal for a strong player/coach who is comfortable leading from the production floor, developing employees, improving processes, solving equipment and workflow problems, and building a scalable operation as the business continues to grow.

WHAT YOU WILL LEAD

You will have responsibility for the overall performance of production and fulfillment operations, including:

• Daily production execution
• Workforce planning and leadership
• Production scheduling and capacity management
• Quality control
• Inventory and material availability
• Equipment reliability and preventive maintenance
• Workflow and process improvement
• Order fulfillment and distribution
• Cost control and labor productivity
• Production-floor safety and organization

KEY RESPONSIBILITIES

Production & Operations Leadership

• Lead day-to-day production and fulfillment operations to ensure customer orders are completed accurately, efficiently, and on schedule.
• Establish daily and weekly production priorities based on customer commitments, available labor, equipment capacity, and material availability.
• Monitor production performance and quickly address bottlenecks, capacity constraints, quality issues, equipment problems, and scheduling conflicts.
• Maintain strong visibility on the production floor and take a hands-on approach to operational problem-solving.
• Build operating processes that can support continued business growth without sacrificing quality or customer service.

Team Leadership & Development

• Lead, coach, train, and develop production employees, team leads, and supervisors.
• Establish clear expectations for productivity, quality, attendance, safety, and accountability.
• Evaluate staffing requirements and adjust labor deployment based on production demand.
• Participate in hiring, onboarding, training, employee development, and performance management.
• Build a collaborative, high-accountability culture focused on execution and continuous improvement.

Production Planning & Scheduling

• Develop and manage production schedules across multiple departments and work centers.
• Balance labor, equipment, raw materials, order priority, and delivery dates to maximize production flow.
• Coordinate urgent or high-priority customer orders without disrupting overall plant performance.
• Track work-in-process and ensure jobs move efficiently from production through finishing, packaging, and fulfillment.
• Improve scheduling disciplines to increase on-time completion and reduce production delays.

Apparel Decoration & Technical Operations

• Provide operational oversight across processes such as screen printing, embroidery, direct-to-film printing, garment decoration, finishing, and related production activities.
• Ensure artwork, job specifications, proofs, production files, and customer requirements are properly communicated before production begins.
• Partner with production teams to troubleshoot print quality, decoration, material, equipment, and setup issues.
• Ensure production methods are repeatable and consistent across customer orders.
• Establish standards for setup, changeovers, job preparation, production execution, and final inspection.

Quality Management

• Establish and enforce quality standards throughout the production process.
• Ensure finished products meet requirements for color, placement, graphics, text, decoration quality, packaging, and order accuracy.
• Identify recurring quality issues and implement corrective actions.
• Develop processes that reduce rework, scrap, production errors, and customer complaints.
• Create accountability for quality at the operator and department level rather than relying solely on final inspection.

Equipment & Maintenance

• Ensure production equipment is properly maintained and available to support customer demand.
• Develop and maintain preventive-maintenance schedules.
• Coordinate equipment repairs, vendor support, spare parts, and maintenance priorities.
• Troubleshoot operational and technical issues that affect productivity.
• Identify opportunities for equipment upgrades, automation, improved layouts, and additional production capacity.

Inventory & Material Management

• Maintain appropriate inventory levels for production materials and consumables.
• Ensure critical materials are available before jobs enter production.
• Improve inventory controls, storage practices, material flow, and replenishment processes.
• Reduce unnecessary inventory while protecting production continuity.
• Coordinate with purchasing and suppliers to resolve shortages and material availability issues.

Continuous Improvement

• Evaluate production workflows and identify opportunities to improve throughput, labor utilization, quality, cycle time, and operating cost.
• Improve facility layout, material movement, workstation organization, and production flow.
• Implement standardized procedures and operating expectations across departments.
• Reduce downtime, unnecessary movement, rework, and production bottlenecks.
• Establish meaningful production KPIs and use data to drive accountability and improvement.

WHAT WE ARE LOOKING FOR

Required Experience

• Significant experience leading production, manufacturing, apparel decoration, printing, promotional products, fulfillment, or a similar high-volume operating environment.
• Strong knowledge of at least several apparel-decoration processes such as:
• Screen printing
• Embroidery
• Direct-to-film printing
• Garment decoration
• Production finishing
• Order fulfillment
• Demonstrated experience leading production employees and supervisors.
• Strong production-planning and scheduling capabilities.
• Experience improving operational performance, productivity, quality, and workflow.
• Strong understanding of inventory, materials, equipment, and preventive maintenance.
• Ability to troubleshoot production problems and make fast, practical operating decisions.

Leadership Profile

We are looking for someone who is:

• Hands-on: Comfortable spending significant time on the production floor.
• Accountable: Takes ownership of results rather than simply reporting problems.
• Organized: Able to manage multiple departments, customer deadlines, and competing priorities.
• Operationally strong: Understands how labor, machines, materials, scheduling, and workflow interact.
• Quality focused: Maintains high standards while still driving productivity.
• Analytical: Uses operating metrics and production data to identify problems and improve results.
• People oriented: Can coach employees, develop supervisors, and build strong teams.
• Calm under pressure: Able to manage changing priorities and urgent customer requirements without losing control of the operation.

IDEAL BACKGROUNDS

Strong candidates may currently hold titles such as:

Director of Production

Director of Operations

Production Operations Manager

Manufacturing Manager

Plant Manager

Apparel Production Manager

Screen Printing Operations Manager

Director of Manufacturing

Fulfillment Operations Manager

Production & Distribution Manager

Candidates from custom apparel, promotional products, decorated apparel, screen printing, embroidery, garment manufacturing, contract printing, branded merchandise, or related production environments are strongly encouraged to apply.

WHY CONSIDER THIS OPPORTUNITY?

• Highly visible leadership role with significant influence over the operation.
• Opportunity to improve and scale an established production organization.
• Hands-on authority to improve people, processes, equipment, workflow, and production performance.
• Growing organization with continued opportunity for operational expansion.
• Highly competitive compensation package.
• Relocation assistance available for the successful candidate.