About 97% of clothing sold in the United States is made overseas. We aren’t saying that’s bad. We’re saying that for our flagship piece — the Quiet Hours Hoodie — the math worked out differently.
What “made in the USA” actually means here
For our hoodie:
- The cotton is grown and milled in the United States.
- The fabric is knit at a North Carolina mill that’s been running for three generations.
- The hoodies are cut, sewn, and finished at a small contract sewer in the Southeast.
- The embroidery is done in our own workshop in northern Wisconsin.
That’s about as transparent a chain as we know how to build.
Why it costs more
Honestly: labor. A garment-maker in the U.S. earns roughly 8–12x what a garment-maker in Bangladesh or Vietnam earns. Multiply that by sewing time, fabric cost, and shipping, and a USA-sewn 12oz cotton hoodie costs roughly $35–$40 just to make. That’s before we add packaging, labels, marketing, returns, or any margin.
It’s why most $35 hoodies aren’t made in the U.S. The math doesn’t close.
Why we still do it
- Quality control is faster. When something is wrong with a sample, we drive (or fly a few hours) instead of emailing a factory in another time zone.
- Accountability is direct. We know the names of the people who sew our hoodies. They know our names. That’s harder to fake than a certification.
- Smaller runs are possible. Most overseas factories require minimums of 1,000+ units per color. Our domestic partner runs 50.
- It supports a craft we want to keep alive. The number of cut-and-sew shops in the United States has shrunk by something like 90% since 1990. There are reasons that’s a problem.
What we don’t claim
The other three pieces in our line aren’t fully USA-made (yet), and we won’t pretend they are. The Camp Tee uses an imported Comfort Colors blank that we embroider stateside. The Bigfoot Trucker is made in the United States. The Northwoods Jacket’s sourcing is in final review. We’ll publish the full story before its first production run.
We’d rather be specific than wave a flag.
The long bet
The plan is to keep moving the line stateside as we grow. We don’t know how fast we can do it. We do know that every time we add another piece to the “sewn here” list, we’re a tiny bit closer to the kind of brand we want to run.
— Filed by Squatch & Co.
Heads up: Lifestyle imagery on Squatch & Co. is currently a rendered preview while our spring photo shoot wraps. The garment specs and origin claims you read here are accurate to what ships.