Faribault, Minnesota
CNN
—
It takes about 20 steps for tufts of raw wool to become a signature Faribault Mill blanket, and it all happens under one roof in this southern Minnesota city.
It’s a symphonic process that has been honed over 160 years and now one where employees (including third- and fourth-generation mill staff members) work alongside a blend of state-of-the-art machinery and 19th century equipment from start to finish.
The only things missing from the mill are the sheep themselves: Many of them are busy grazing fields a few states over in the Rocky Mountains.
It’s been largely business as usual at the Faribault Mill in recent months, a state of affairs that has very recently become a luxury for scores of US companies. Faribault Mill remains overwhelmingly insulated from the uncertainty injected into the US economy as President Donald Trump’s sweeping and steep tariffs upend operations for businesses reliant upon global trade.
“We haven’t had to create a war room; we’ve just continued to make blankets the way we’ve been doing it for a long time,” Ross Widmoyer, Faribault Mill’s chief executive officer, told CNN.
If anything, it’s only gotten busier. Widmoyer has been fielding a slew of calls from potential new customers, retailers trying to stave off shortages and shore up their shelves come fall and Christmastime.
Still, despite the possible boon, Faribault Mill and other companies with domestic-centric supply chains aren’t entirely immune from negative implications of Trump’s ever-shifting trade moves.
“That’s the thing: The uncertainty and the fear of a slowdown in consumer spending,” Widmoyer said. “I don’t care if you’re making product in the United States, or you’re making everything overseas. That will certainly not help any business if there’s a slowdown.”
The US imported about $723 million worth of pet toys last year, 93% of which originated from China, according to a trade data analysis provided to CNN by Jason Miller, professor of supply chain management at Michigan State University.
Import tariffs, particularly the 145% level imposed by the US last month on Chinese goods, should be welcome for a company like West Paw, which has made dog toys from recycled materials in scenic Bozeman, Montana, for nearly 29 years.
In that time, West Paw forged a domestic supply chain out of a desire to create economic vitality in the local community while minimizing impact on the environment, said Spencer Williams, West Paw’s founder and CEO.
It certainly came in handy five years ago, when the pandemic snarled once-smooth supply chains. West Paw’s sales soared as demand for pets boomed and as product shortages pinched other manufacturers.
So far this year, Williams has seen a noticeable uptick in requests from businesses large and small interested in carrying West Paw’s toys.
“With the [more than 90%] of pet toys imported from China, we cannot produce all of those in Montana; but we will take on, happily, a partnership with a retailer who’s looking for a long-term relationship,” Williams said.
The potential is ripe for another bountiful period in West Paw’s business; however, 2025 is not expected to be a rinse-and-repeat of the pandemic sales boom for two primary reasons, Williams noted.
First, there’s no certainty these tariffs will remain as they are today.
“I’m not going to double this factory tomorrow or be foolish, because I couldn’t bank on that; I have no assurance that this is going to be the market going forward,” he said. “We scaled a lot in Covid, and then things did slow down a little bit after that. A lot of industries saw that. So, we’re going to be very thoughtful and cautious and serve our customers best with predictability.”
Second, the reverberating effects of tariffs — specifically, retaliatory actions by other countries — stand to deliver a big bite on an important leg of West Paw’s business. The company exports its toys to 40 countries, with Canada being its largest partner. West Paw’s export business accounts for about 15% to 18% of overall sales, Williams said.
West Paw doesn’t want to lose those sales, he said. It’s good business for the company, gets its brand out there globally and brings in foreign currency into the United States.
“We feel like we’ve been at the forefront of doing right in our business by building a supply chain that is durable and independent and private in America since we were founded in 1996; we will not change that,” he said. “And we also believe firmly that we are global citizens who have the opportunity to work with partners around the world.”
“I love our export customers; they challenge us to be better,” he added. “And while it’s hard to love the imports that are coming in at low cost, it also helps us compete, to sharpen our pencil and be really innovative as a company.”
In early 2005, Oneida Limited shuttered its 1 million-square-foot silverware-making facility in Sherrill, New York. Oneida’s move — a continuation of a shuffling of operations overseas — put a fork in the company’s storied run in a town nicknamed “The Silver City.”
The closure also presented an opportunity for two employees to buy the plant and breathe new life into a hampered US manufacturing industry. Their Sherrill Manufacturing compnay would become the sole remaining flatware maker in the US.
Twenty years after that purchase, Sherrill Manufacturing co-founder Greg Owens tells CNN that even more opportunities are abound because of the tariffs that have been imposed.
“Domestic manufacturing is going to have its renaissance if, in fact, there’s follow-through on this,” said Owens, whose Sherrill Manufacturing produces the Liberty Tabletop flatware brand. “It started out with a bang, and I think it’s part of the negotiating process, as there was a pause put in. So, everybody’s sitting in a holding pattern waiting to see what’s going to be the final-final.”
“And when that final-final is announced, and people are confident that it’s going to stick — hopefully through Congress and not through [executive orders], that’s when the investing and hiring begins.”
Liberty Tabletop has plenty of capacity to expand, Owens said, noting the facility could ramp up to four times its output in relatively short order.
Liberty Tabletop, in addition to selling to the US government (particularly military bases) has built a direct-to-consumer business to keep prices down for customers and also has a private label business, which has received an increase in interest since the tariffs were implemented.
To that end, the tariffs on China, in particular, could help level the playing field, Owens said, noting that country produces 80% of the flatware America imports. Additionally, his company inked a three-year supply agreement with its US-based steel provider at the end of last year, which could help guard Liberty Tabletop against any raw material price increases that could occur as a result of trade-related measures.
“It’s better to be lucky than good,” he said. “I think we’re in great shape. There are others who don’t have those agreements that may not be in that same position.”
Tariffs create some winners as well as some losers, Jason Miller, the MSU professor, told CNN.
“The challenge is, it’s a weighted average to see which one is more pronounced,” he said. “My general sense is that right now, we’re in the category where the losing is more pronounced, but we have to see how policy evolves.”
The biggest challenge, by and far, is uncertainty, Miller said.
“Not knowing what’s going to happen is so problematic for businesspeople,” he said.
At the Faribault Mill, Widmoyer said that having more certainty — “whatever that landscape will be” — will enhance businesses’ abilities to plan and invest.
“On the flip side [to the increase in calls from retailers], there are a lot of retailers who I think are just hunkering down, staying put, trying to figure out what’s going to happen next,” he said. “That uncertainty is not sustainable over the long run.”
Still, his company is positioned to withstand some shifts, he said, noting recent seven-figure investments in the mill’s equipment and its workers that improved productivity and allowed for some price cuts for its best-selling products.
“If you do the right things for your customers, it could help you withstand the storms of any economic uncertainty,” he said.
And Faribault Mill has weathered plenty of upheaval since 1865 — including the Civil War, two world wars, multiple recessions, two global pandemics and multiple booms.
“This company has withstood the test of time,” he said. “It hasn’t always been easy, but we figure it out.”
