Here’s How Tariffs Are Impacting Real Manufacturers Today

How are tariffs impacting manufacturers today? There’s plenty of available commentary from economists and thought leaders about how tariffs will impact manufacturers and the larger economy. Missing is the voice of the manufacturers working through these changes today. How are tariffs impacting their sales? What are they doing to prepare? Which ones are struggling? Which are benefiting? In an effort to get to some ground-floor truth, I chatted with four manufacturing leaders to hear about how tariffs are impacting them. The reality that emerged is nuanced, but reveals that already supply and demand is recalibrating, that there is upside and downside to tariffs even within individual companies, and that your perspective on the future depends a lot on where you sit in the supply chain. Here are four stories of real companies navigating tariffs. Early Signals and Optimism Based in Ohio, DECA Manufacturing sources components for its wire harnesses—which serve as the nervous system of complex equipment—from a variety of distributors. While the company gets materials like copper wire from the U.S. and tries to source here first, several of the components their customers request have parts that originate overseas. So, a lot of the company’s suppliers are also in low-cost countries, although not necessarily China. DECA competes with those low-cost countries for contracts, as well, and in a few cases, tariff pressures have led to wins that President Cameron Haring says may or may not have fallen the company’s way without them. “Just the whiff of uncertainty,” he says, has impacted the market. Haring says he’ll become concerned if “a $3 part becomes a $6 part and really starts to eat into margins .... And we’re in a fight with our customer.” But he’s also cautiously hopeful and sees opportunities for manufacturers to move operations back to the U.S., and then to optimize costs through design improvements and automation. He says it’s too soon to say if tariffs are a net win, but there’s one clear benefit. “I think it’s important to change the dialog around manufacturing,” he says. “And I do think that’s changing.” A Boost In Business The tariff impact at Snyder Manufacturing has been clear. They are working in Snyder’s favor, leading to increased sales over the last few months, and the company is optimistic that additional increased sales could come if tariffs stay in place as they are now. That’s because the maker of a PVC vinyl laminate and PVC-coated mesh is in direct competition with cheaper, China-made options. “We can’t compete pricewise,” says Jolene Meese, president at Synder. “[Sometimes] , the price [Chinese companies] are selling it for is less than our raw materials cost.” Instead, Snyder Manufacturing has leaned on quality and service as a selling point, plus its standing as an American manufacturer. The latter has sparked a recent uptick in new customer inquiries, particularly from buyers seeking supply chain stability and long-term domestic partners. But even for Meese and Snyder, uncertainty looms. The company has some available capacity in-house, but expansion and equipment investments would require a deeper belief in the extended tariff picture. Meese believes that while some customers will stick with Snyder Manufacturing due to quality and service, others would likely return to importing if prices on imported goods drop again. To increase the chances that the increased sales stick, Meese believes that consistency and focus on fair competition with China over time is key. “The uncertainty has made it really difficult for people to go ahead and make that decision to switch to a U.S. company,” she says. A Shift To Local Supply Only Goes So Far A wholesale distributor and manufacturer of aluminum building products, Shapes Unlimited started last year diversifying its supplier base to shield itself from possible heightened tariffs under the new administration. Long reliant on imports from Southeast Asia, the company added five new suppliers—three offshore and two domestic—to “mitigate the risk of having too few eggs in too few baskets,” says CEO Doug Rende. “We bet on the fact that tariffs would not be unilaterally deployed across every country on the planet. Oops.” Even with additional domestic suppliers, tariffs have created new cost pressures and unpredictability. “We ultimately pass it on,” Rende says. “You have no choice.” In 2025, sales are up 25% year-to-date. The company stockpiled inventory, but that lower, tariff-imposed stock is now dwindling, lead times have lengthened, and costs are climbing. The deeper, long-term challenge is structural. He points to a massive shortfall in domestic aluminum production. “You’re not going to make up that shortfall in any sort of reasonable timeframe,” he says. “It will take a decade, at least.” Rende says reinvigorating American manufacturing will take coordinated investment—not just policy—but it’s difficult for companies to make investments in this “whack-a-mole” environment. “Over the last several decades in particular, as it relates to steel and aluminum production, those who’ve been progressive have invested aggressively in new automation, new equipment, new procedures, to speed the process and lower the total costs,” he says. “The lead times for the sophisticated equipment alone are 24-plus months between production, shipment, and installation.” The Advantages Of Being In The ‘Middle Of The Dog’s Tail’ As a service provider to the metals industry, Uniserv services its customers’ need to slit to width. They have, therefore, benefited from the fact they don’t buy steel directly. Some of their customers, however, buy from other countries like Canada, and Uniserv Vice President Jeremy Kerola has seen those customers re-assessing how much steel they’re bringing across the border. “Uncertainty leads to volatility,” he says. “Volatility leads to a lack of confidence. And that lack of confidence, yeah, makes it challenging to tread these waters.” Uniserv’s domestic demand and its position within the supply chain has insulated the company and kept business steady for now. “We’re in the middle of the dog’s tail,” he says. “The base starts to swing, and then the tip is going to have a hard reaction. We find ourselves in the middle where everybody needs value-added manufacturing, which is what we are.” Still, Kerola is realistic about the road ahead and the timeline that reshoring would require. “You’re talking four to five years” to rebuild domestic capacity, he says, with some equipment alone coming with a two-year lead time. But he’s also optimistic that the industry’s short-term pain could lead to long-term gain. “When people go to work, there’s a lot of money to be put back in Americans’ pockets,” Kerola says. Optimism Through Uncertain Times For the companies seeing upticks in orders or anticipating them like Snyder and Deca, tariffs can be a real boon. At MAGNET, the manufacturing consulting firm I run in Northeast Ohio, we’ve seen some companies use tariffs as an opportunity to make meaningful investments in automation and other Industry 4.0 technologies. Even if tariffs go away, these companies could retain their competitive edge over the long haul and permanently reshore product. But not all manufacturers are comfortable enough to make those investments, as tariff uncertainty paints a blurry picture of future supply and demand. Recent history proves that cost drives the ship—after the pandemic, when offshore pricing and availability rebalanced, the locally made (and, often, heroically reinvented) alternatives were dropped overnight. There is real fear that tariffs could go away for geopolitical reasons and eliminate the benefits of reshoring. As the stories above show, small and medium-sized companies are hesitant to risk it with the significant investments in automation that would enable them to compete with overseas production long-term. Until they are, these companies will remain on a roller coaster. Source: https://www.forbes.com/sites/ethankarp/2025/05/09/heres-how-tariffs-are-impacting-real-manufacturers-today/