I guess this is a bit of an open ended question but I thought I would take a little time to tell you the types of ties made by tie makers and tie manufacturers.

Lets begin first with the reason the tie is made, in other words, who is the tie being made for?

If the tie is being made for companies then they would be classified as corporate ties, custom ties or branded ties.

If ties are made for schools then they would be called school ties but this could also include matric ties.

If the ties are being made for security companies then they would be called security ties and if they are made for club, then they would be called club ties.

Generally with these ties being corporate ties, custom ties, branded ties, security ties and club ties, the ties would be of an adult length and width which is normally between 147cm and 150 cm long and between 8cm and 9cm wide. We are noticing however that there is a current trend to wards narrow ties which can be anything between 6cm and 7.5cm wide but the same length as this does not change.

 When it comes to school ties, this is a different story. The reason is that we have children of all ages shapes and sizes who wear school ties, so generally, the tie maker or tie manufacturer  will make ties to suit a particular age group as opposed to anything else other than the actual design required on the tie.

So with younger children, ie junior school kids, tie makers or tie manufacturers would normally  produce what is called a bobby knot- this is a pre tied tie that goes around the neck of the child with elastic. It never has to be knotted as it is pre knotted in the first place.

From there, the ties will become regular school ties except that they will be shorter than an adult regular tie.

The lengths of the school ties vary depending on the age of the child or the grade they are in but normally, there are 2 lengths of regular ties over and above the bobby knot ties in a primary school environment.

In a high school environment there can be between one and three lengths of school ties, these being the longest length of the primary school tie up until the adult length which is as I said between 147 and 150cm long.

Normally the ties will not have a width of less than 7cm, even on the bobby knot ties.

Tie makers or tie manufacturers pride themselves on being able to make the various lengths of school ties which are generally quite standard amongst most tie makers or tie manufacturers.

Also, tie manufacturers pride themselves on ensuring that the thickness of the school ties is correct, it has to be thick enough to give the school ties body but not too thick that they cannot be properly tied, this is extremely important.