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Why It’s Impossible for Most Small Businesses to Manufacture in the US
American companies that make everything from keychains to mattresses say Chinese manufacturing is superior, and tariffs won’t be enough to shift production to the United States.
As Trump has played a game of a tariff peek-a-boo in recent weeks, repeatedly announcing new rates and then calling them off, business owners have struggled to contend with the whiplash and plan for the future of their companies. WIRED spoke to over a dozen US business owners, including mom-and-pop shops, fashion brands that have over $100 million in annual revenue, a tattoo supply vendor in Philadelphia, and a mattress maker in Ohio, who all said the same thing: Chinese manufacturing is still the gold standard of the world and moving production to a new region would be extremely difficult, regardless of how high tariffs are. Many US business owners told WIRED that when they explored manufacturing domestically in the past, they have run into a wide range of challenges, such as higher costs, trouble sourcing raw materials, lack of available labor, and regulatory restrictions.
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