Personnel permitted to wear it at first had their camo fatigues custom-made by local tailors, with ARVN uniforms being too small for most Americans; for this reason there were many variations of the basic tiger stripe pattern.

In 1963, Marine Corps Advisors and from 1964, 5th Special Forces Group of the Green Berets contracted with Vietnamese and other Southeast Asian producers to make fatigues and other items such as boonie hats using tiger stripe fabric.

Being manufactured by different producers in places like Thailand, Korea and Okinawa, Japan, there was a wide variety of patterns and color shade variations.

The Special Forces-advised Civilian Irregular Defense Group (CIDG) used tiger stripe from 1963 until disbanded in 1971.

[citation needed] The pattern was tested by the USMC prior to the adoption of MARPAT through the Scout Sniper Instructor School.