The activities of the Indian clothing industry supplying Western markets have been investigated, with particular reference to identifying where improvements could be made to supply chain management. Focus group discussions, case studies and questionnaire analysis established that long lead-times in pre-production areas were of great concern. However Indian apparel manufacturers were found to be more cost conscious and rather less conscious about the value of time in pre-production areas. It was found that pre-production activities constituted 73% of total manufacturing lead time and have high positive correlation (0.96) with total manufacturing lead time. Preproduction activities in India mainly consist of prototype making and pre-production sample development; of which approval processes were found to have a high correlation (0.63) with pre-production. A significant (more than 50%) time of all activities consist of waiting time, which has positive influence on total lead time (0.86)