Tariffs, Production Costs Drive Sourcing for Deep Drawn Stamping

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This Thomas Index Report is sponsored by Boker’s, who is celebrating 100 years as a leading manufacturer of precision metal stampings, washers, spacers, and shims.

Hello. In this week’s Thomas Index Report, we’re going to take a look at sourcing activity for Deep Drawn Stamping by users of the Thomasnet.com platform. Our data shows that over the past 12 weeks, sourcing activity for this category is up 42% over its historical average. It’s also up 31% year over year.

Deep drawn stamping is the process of using a mechanical press and a die to form a piece of flat sheet metal into a three dimensional cylindrical, square, or rectangular shape. The process is used to create seamless items such as cans, tubes, cases, and other enclosures.

Deep drawn stamping is a subset of the larger metal stamping market, which was a $223 billion global market in 2017, but is expected to grow to be a $307 billion market by 2026. This growth is expected to be driven in large part by the automotive, aerospace, and consumer electronics industries.

More generally, some of the growth in the metal stamping market can be attributed to manufacturers replacing other processes such as die-casting and forging to benefit from what many see to be the higher production rates and lower production costs of metal stamping.

Tariffs on foreign metals have definitely impacted this industry, which relies on sheet metal to create the blanks it uses to stamp into finished parts. In fact, our data shows a 12% year over year increase in sourcing for sheet metals on our platform, as manufacturers including metal stampers look to add domestic suppliers to their supply chains.

According to market research firm IBIS-World, the number of metal stamping businesses in the U.S. has declined by roughly 1% per year on average over the past five years. But as tariffs, a friendlier regulatory environment, and the growing supply chain benefits of manufacturing domestically have more and more businesses reshoring their overseas manufacturing, it will be interesting to see whether the number of American metal stamping businesses increases in the coming months and years, or if mergers and acquisitions result in fewer, larger businesses setting up to meet the growing demand for metal stamping.

Moving on, here’s a look at the top 10 industrial product and service categories being sourced on the Thomasnet.com platform over the past four weeks.

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