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ESTABLISHED 1953
For many years at All Metals Fabricating, we’ve had conversations with customers who are considering reshoring. But recently, more companies have been taking a new look at the strategy as the economics of overseas manufacturing have changed.
We are proud to be an American manufacturer, and we welcome conversations with companies that are exploring a move back to domestic production. But we believe transparency is important in our work, and so we are always candid with customers: reshoring can offer advantages, but the decision depends on factors like your part design, your quantities, your timeline, and your budget.
There are several cases where a return to domestic manufacturing can be the right fit, including:
Low- to medium-volume production: Offshore manufacturing often looks attractive on a piece-price basis, but that advantage can shrink quickly at lower quantities. For instance, if your order does not justify a full container load, freight can become a much larger cost factor. Smaller shipments or air freight can significantly raise the true cost of offshore sourcing.
Urgent timelines: Lead times are naturally slower when parts have to travel such long distances by ship. If your team needs a faster turnaround, domestic manufacturing may provide an advantage.
Fluctuating demand: An established part with stable, predictable demand may be fine for overseas sourcing. But if demand is still changing or surges are difficult to predict, a domestic manufacturer can help you respond quickly and avoid shortages.
Rework risk: If a part is complex and mistakes are costly, the nature of overseas manufacturing can make it harder to collaborate on problems, and they may ultimately take longer to resolve. And while assumptions about consistently poor overseas quality are outdated, American-made quality still can’t be matched.
Businesses evaluating reshoring need to understand one central thing: If you only compare quoted price per part, American manufacturers can never approach the prices of the lowest offshore competitors. This has been true even with recent tariff increases.
However, one of the most important points in any reshoring discussion is that price and cost are not the same thing. We always encourage our customers to consider the full landed cost.
Full landed cost includes not only factors like freight and tariffs, but also inventory carrying costs, the lost revenue associated with any long delays and rework, the business impact of slow response times, and more.
Some of these factors are hard to quantify precisely, but they are still very real. If you are considering reshoring, it’s worth looking back at past projects and trying to determine answers to important questions: How many issues required extra follow-up? How much time did your team spend managing them? What did delays cost in lost production time or missed market opportunities?
If you decide to re-evaluate domestic production, it helps to have a design that is ready for American manufacturing. You may have to adjust designs for parts that were originally produced overseas. Think of these adjustments along the lines of simple “design for manufacturing” tweaks, but consider the process “design for reshoring.”
Above all, we encourage customers to:
American options may only seem to differ slightly from other countries’ standard options, but even small differences in thicknesses, material grades, or hardware specifications can significantly affect cost and availability. A design that is based on nonstandard options may be more expensive than expected.
If you are exploring whether reshoring is the right move for your business, we are ready to help you evaluate the tradeoffs honestly and build a plan for success. With our broad range of capabilities, including metal fabrication, precision machining, and custom metal finishing, reshoring becomes an easier process.
Request a quote or contact us to discuss your next project!
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