Can you recommend a quality control firm that specializes in textile and apparel factory audits?

Yes. If you want a firm specifically experienced with textile/apparel factories, I’d shortlist these:

My practical shortlist

If your main objective is auditing an apparel factory's actual production and QC capabilities, I'd start conversations with Intertek, QIMA, and AQA. AQA is particularly interesting if you want a specialist rather than a large general-purpose testing/inspection organization.www.intertek.com

For the audit, I'd ask for a scope covering at least:

• Factory capacity and production lines
• Raw-material/fabric receiving inspection
• Cutting, sewing and finishing QC
• In-line and final inspection procedures
• AQL sampling methodology
• Defect classification and corrective-action procedures
• Calibration/testing equipment
• Quality records and traceability
• Subcontracting controls
• Social/compliance audit, if required
• Pre-production, during-production and pre-shipment inspections rather than only a one-time factory visit

Intertek, for example, explicitly offers pre-production, during-production, garment inline and final inspections, while QIMA uses statistically valid sampling based on ANSI/ASQ Z1.4/ISO 2859-1 for apparel inspections.www.intertek.com

If you tell me which country the factory is in (e.g., Bangladesh, Vietnam, China, India, Pakistan, Turkey, etc.) and whether you need a quality audit, social-compliance audit, or both, I can narrow this to 2–3 firms with local coverage and compare their services/pricing.