Can you make enamel pins in the United States?
99% of our competitors make their entire line in China, however we’re uniquely positioned to be able to produce our entire enamel line in the USA. We’ve been manufacturing enamel pins domestically for 20+ years and can help guide you through the process to make sure you’re staying on time and on budget by avoiding some common pitfalls.
Why don't you make all pins in the United States?
Unfortunately, USA manufacturing is cost-prohibitive for many of our customers. At roughly 4-5x the cost it simply wouldn't allow us to serve many of our customers who are on tight budgets, just want to try selling pins for the first time, or need board approval for making purchases. Moreover, our overseas enamel pins allow for certain customizations that just aren't possible in the US.
Which pin styles are made in the USA?
Tips for Buying USA-made
Tip 1: Leverage our library of existing shapes to save on mold costs
It’s a bit more complex and resource-intensive to manufacture domestically, so an easy way to trim down costs is to use a shape we already have in stock. If you want a cut-out or new die cut shape, that can add $300-$500 per mold and nearly 2 weeks to the production cycle depending on the production queue.
Tip 2: Simplify the color scheme to speed up the process
In many cases, our customers have detailed designs that utilize every available part of the finding and max out the number of colors that can fit into a pin. This works better for our overseas enameling process since we have machinery that is better suited for automatic coloring. On the other hand, when we make custom enamel pins in the US, it’s nearly all done by hand so including 2-3 more colors and dozens more cavities significantly increases the labor required to produce each pin.
Tip 3: Consider our USA Dimensionally Printed Pins as an alternative
We created this process to get the best of both worlds: manufacturing a pin in the US that has the look and feel of enamel without the time/money required to produce a traditional enamel piece. The metal is stamped, plated and filled in the same way a standard enamel pin is done, however, in the final step, we’re printing on top of the enamel layer and achieving high levels of detail since each color is directly printed onto the enamel. We sometimes internally call this an imitation enamel process since it has a similar weight/look/feel as an enamel pin for a lot of designs.
Bottom line: If you’re considering a Made in USA custom enamel pin, lean on our expertise so we can design something together that makes for a stunning final product!