alt.hn

4/24/2025 at 9:21:37 PM

People say they’ll pay more for “made in the USA” so we ran a test

 https://afina.com/blogs/news/made-in-usa

by ericzawo

4/24/2025 at 9:51:59 PM

> The only difference? One was labeled “Made in Asia” and priced at $129. The other, “Made in the USA,” at $239. [85% more expensive]

> And many are willing to pay a premium for domestically made goods. Nearly half (48%) say they’d be willing to pay around 10–20% more. 17% say they’d be willing to pay ~30% more for an American-made product over an imported one. - https://www.retailbrew.com/stories/2022/07/28/consumers-will...

The article does not say how many would pay 85% more, but since the number more than halved from 10% to 30% more, I would hazard not many.

by like_any_other

4/24/2025 at 10:02:57 PM

I suspect that those folks who answer survey questions of "would you pay more for made in the USA" with "yes" are thinking (if they are thinking at all) of paying $2 to $3 more on a $100 item, not paying $110 more on a $100 item.

None of the surveys are ever crafted to ask: "How much more would you pay for a $100 item for 'made in the USA'?".

by pwg

4/24/2025 at 10:49:25 PM

It is largely pointless, in general, to survey people about how much they would pay for things. Taking such answers seriously has led a lot of companies to ruin. The whole point of pricing is that no one knows how much something is worth until it is actually selling (or not).

by snowwrestler

4/25/2025 at 8:10:26 PM

Yeah isn’t this like the number one lesson for startups? People will say lots of things when there’s no money or reputations on the line.

by cjaybo

4/24/2025 at 10:10:49 PM

The survey already used percentages. As for not thinking - it would seem to me worrying about the effects of one's purchases on the local economy, and the knock-on effects this has on sovereignty and politics, takes more thought than just short-sightedly picking the cheaper option no matter what.

by like_any_other

4/24/2025 at 10:21:35 PM

Most people don't understand percentages.

by dboreham

4/24/2025 at 11:12:28 PM

Maybe: Most American people don't understand percentages?

by asfodelsu

4/26/2025 at 8:12:25 AM

Most people, no matter the place.

A lot if people are surprised when they discover that 100 + 50% - 59% is not 100.

I do not like percentages myself, I would prefer we say 0.8 of something because the option becomes a simple multiplication and it is easier not to make mistakes

by BrandoElFollito

4/25/2025 at 3:26:25 PM

Most people. They teach doctors to use frequency representations (i.e. 12 of 100) for a reason.

by disgruntledphd2

4/24/2025 at 10:10:34 PM

> Nearly half (48%) say they’d be willing to pay around 10–20% more.

$110-120 for a $100 item, no?

by manmal

4/25/2025 at 12:22:55 AM

I believe they meant an additional $110, which would be a 110% markup.

by aadhavans

4/25/2025 at 1:17:09 AM

Why do you believe this?

by pseudalopex

4/25/2025 at 1:35:29 PM

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=43787992

> of paying $2 to $3 more on a $100 item, not paying $110 more on a $100 item

$110 more on a $100 item would be $210. I have no idea where pwg got the “$110 more”, though. Seems the in-context comparison would be “$85 more”.

by lcnPylGDnU4H9OF

4/25/2025 at 6:42:15 AM

Probably because that’s approximately in line with the article.

by d1sxeyes

4/24/2025 at 10:22:17 PM

Quality is also an undefined variable, because people may pay 10% more for an American made product that is of comparable quality, but they may also be willing to pay 110% more if the Asian counterpart is poor quality.

When you’re using the same exact photos, there’s no discernible quality difference.

by goodluckchuck

4/25/2025 at 2:21:55 AM

Ironically, perhaps, but in 2025 I'd argue the Asian counterpart would probably be of higher quality, at least in the initial transition back to US manufacturing. AND it would be cheaper.

by secstate

4/25/2025 at 2:17:45 AM

It's like when people say they'll pay extra for more legroom but only book the cheapest possible tickets.

by tedunangst

4/25/2025 at 10:46:09 AM

Legroom is mostly overpriced, people would be more willing to pay if it was properly priced. Paying 50% more doesn't get you 50% more area in the plane.

by Jensson

4/25/2025 at 9:59:59 AM

I’ve never done that - I have flown a lot in my life, much of it internationally and the flight times / fewest number of layovers trumps cost.

by apercu

4/25/2025 at 9:45:42 PM

£70 on a £100 ticket? Yeah no wonder! They're too poor after paying £100 for a checked bag

Or long haul premium economy which is just absurdly priced now, often 100-200% more than economy.

by switch007

4/24/2025 at 10:23:12 PM

Americans in the market for a "premium" shower head are clearly not looking for the cheapest thing on the market. So it's obvious that they would be willing to spend more for the added feel-good of a domestic product.

by benwilber0

4/24/2025 at 10:11:59 PM

As a Canadian, "Made in the USA" is currently a mark against, and I would only consider buying that product if it was absolutely the only remotely reasonable option.

by 0xTJ

4/25/2025 at 12:39:30 AM

As an American, I’m doing what I can to boycott stuff made in red states. I can and do pay up to 2x more for blue state stuff (which is typically higher quality, to be honest), and go imported otherwise.

by hedora

4/25/2025 at 1:21:47 AM

What kind of stuff made in red states are you boycotting?

by bag_boy

4/25/2025 at 1:29:10 AM

Easy things: Alcohol (beer, whiskey)

Harder things: Food brands that support trump. JB Smucker. Whole Foods (owned by amazon). Apple (look at the recent #appletoo NLRB scandal.)

Really hard things (looking for an alternative): Amazon (not red state, but Bezos is pretty bad).

Also, any big-ticket discretionary purchases are getting delayed, bought from someone else or bought used.

by hedora

4/25/2025 at 1:05:05 PM

[dead]

by pixxel

4/24/2025 at 10:20:36 PM

You would rather "Made in China" over "Made in the USA?"

by internetter

4/25/2025 at 1:55:47 AM

Between a trade war, abuse by border services, threats of annexation, economic instability taking a dump on my retirement and cost of living. For sure. I have conferences, memories in Hawaii, family in the US and I ain’t going. I actually hope life in the US becomes more uncomfortable for the average person for a while so the ideology driving MAGA becomes persona non grata for a generation or two. I’ll vote the only way I can: my money. -a slighted Canadian.

by zeagle

4/24/2025 at 10:26:08 PM

China hasn't threatened to make Canada a Chinese province so given no friendly alternative, I'd 100% buy the Chinese model.

by jszymborski

4/25/2025 at 9:42:27 AM

and a whole lot of stuff coming from the US to Canada, is just transhipped made in China products, so Canadians could do well from establishing new supply chains......aaaaand reversing that trend:)

by metalman

4/24/2025 at 10:31:03 PM

Given Tibet, Taiwan, Hong Kong, and Xinjiang, that is possibly the worst example you could have chosen.

by like_any_other

4/24/2025 at 10:46:50 PM

First, it's not an example I'm replying directly to the question.

Second, as a Canadian, I'm primarily concerned with the sovereignty of my country. Given both powers are expansionist, I'll take the one that isn't personally threatening me.

As mentioned in my previous comment, given a choice to deal with a non-expansionist, free democracy, I'd much quicker patronize them.

by jszymborski

4/25/2025 at 12:25:57 AM

China is operating police stations in your country [1,2], subverting your elections [3,4], and got you to pass a trade agreement tilted wildly in their favor [5,6]. If you're worried about real sovereignty, your top current threat is China, that will happily pull the strings while letting you have sovereignty in name only.

[1] Why are Chinese police operating in Canada, while our own government and security services apparently look the other way? - https://web.archive.org/web/20220926120429/https://www.thegl...

[2] Canada police probe alleged Chinese 'police stations' in Montreal - https://www.reuters.com/world/americas/canada-police-probe-a...

[3] CSIS documents reveal Chinese strategy to influence Canada’s 2021 election - https://web.archive.org/web/20230217155126/https://www.thegl...

[4] CSIS documents reveal a web of Chinese influence in Canada - https://web.archive.org/web/20230227134241/https://www.thegl...

[5] Canadian governments are locked in for a generation. If Canada finds the deal unsatisfactory, it cannot be cancelled completely for 31 years. China benefits much more than Canada, because of a clause allowing existing restrictions in each country to stay in place. Chinese companies get to play on a relatively level field in Canada, while maintaining wildly arbitrary practices and rules for Canadian companies in China. - https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/fipa-agreement-with-china-wha...

[6] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Canada-China_Promotion_and_Rec...

by like_any_other

4/25/2025 at 1:56:52 AM

I'm under no illusion that the government of the People's Republic of China is a friend to Canada nor do I think any of my comments make it seem that way. I reiterate my commitment to patronize non-imperial free democracies.

I have a long history of fighting against equivocations of the US and China under previous administrations, but over the course of less than 100 days the US has declared literal economic war against all its allies and has made it clear that it is hostile to free democracies the world over.

by jszymborski

4/25/2025 at 5:31:05 AM

> If you're worried about real sovereignty, your top current threat is China,

No, there's still only one foreign leader that's repeatedly threatened to annex my country. The one we share a border with, not an ocean.

And thanks so much for posting some articles I've already read. At this stage I'd rather have some BYD factories than Tesla.

by ChoGGi

4/25/2025 at 2:43:41 PM

If you're more worried about bark than bite, then yours is a reasonable position to take.

by like_any_other

4/25/2025 at 9:50:00 AM

a few years back, China did offer to buy EVERYTHING, that Alberta could produce....but not the actual place.....bet there are some realy hard talks happening right now The bottom line is that there is only so much stuff to go around on the planet, so all that CAN happen, is a big fucking game of musical chairs, but maybe thats, a good thing.

by metalman

4/24/2025 at 10:51:52 PM

I can't wrap my head around how your comment is relevant at all.

by rs186

4/25/2025 at 12:41:20 AM

Any of those places a place in Canada?

by vel0city

4/25/2025 at 12:19:48 AM

Nor has the US. One particular person in the US has talked about that. I don't particularly see how it's justified to take it out on a country of 300 million people when the vast majority of them aren't responsible for what you object to.

by bigstrat2003

4/25/2025 at 12:27:11 AM

The leader represents the country because the votes of the citizens put him in power. Nobody else in the US government with a similar amount of power has rejected or denied the 51st state rhetoric. This is what worries Canadians: nobody is stopping the American president. There are no checks and balances.

by bcrl

4/25/2025 at 12:29:14 AM

It's not just one guy it's THE one guy that really matters. And a majority of voters picked that guy.

by vanattab

4/25/2025 at 1:07:17 AM

I guess I’ll be the “technically” guy and point out that’s not true. Trump has more votes than any other candidate, but the majority of voters were for Harris or 3rd party.

by alphabettsy

4/25/2025 at 4:19:34 PM

Huh, you're right[1]. Trump only got 49.80% of the popular vote.

Of course, Kennedy (who is in Trump's cabinet, and seems broadly aligned with the MAGA agenda) got another 0.49%... and Oliver (the MAGA-adjacent Libertarian candidate) got another 0.42%. Hardly the ringing endorsement of "American's didn't really pick the guy" that Canadians want to hear.

[1] https://www.fec.gov/resources/cms-content/documents/2024pres...

by burnerthrow008

4/25/2025 at 12:40:46 AM

It's only the president of the United States vaguely threatening war against another country. It's not like his opinion matters or anything.

by vel0city

4/24/2025 at 10:36:48 PM

At this point, that is a pretty popular sentiment in Canada.

by dghlsakjg

4/24/2025 at 11:46:23 PM

Not only in Canada but in the whole Western world.

Travel to the US, Tesla (which is very closely associated to Trump, via Musk) are already collapsing at an unprecedented speed. The only comparable period would be Covid lockdowns. The difference is that in 2020 this was expected to be somewhat temporary, even if the duration was unknown at the time, while this time is much more sentimental - it will take decades to unwind it. It's like trust - it takes a long time to build, but you can destroy it all in a second. And Trump did just that.

by TheAlchemist

4/25/2025 at 9:56:25 AM

Well, I mean, China isn't currently threatening to invade Canada, so there's that.

by rsynnott

4/25/2025 at 10:03:09 AM

I’m a dual citizen. Either we will never have elections again because America is a theocratic dictatorship, or diplomatic and economic relations will be restored. It is only through gerrymandering and propaganda that the current clownshow is in power. Oh, and racism, that contributed too.

by apercu

4/25/2025 at 4:31:53 PM

Don't forget to add wide-spectrum dissatisfaction with the economy and incompetence of the incumbent party's campaign team to your list.

Harris ran a very left-of-center campaign in the 2020 primary election, and soundbites from that were played on repeat in 2024 (some of which didn't age well and some of which were always unpopular in certain circles). That that would happen was an easily foreseeable consequence of making her the candidate. The incumbent party could have chosen a different candidate if they had made an earlier decision to not try to re-elect the president.

You can't cure the disease if you get the diagnosis wrong.

by burnerthrow008

4/25/2025 at 5:25:01 PM

Trump should have been an automatic loss for the republicans,. regardless of if the Democrats were led by a literal clown who promised free balloon animals for all. He was openly fascist-leaning and repeatedly demonstrated his lack of care for the truth.

by 0xTJ

4/25/2025 at 5:22:31 PM

Yes, 100% absolutely.

by 0xTJ

4/24/2025 at 10:40:31 PM

Absolutely.

by tumsfestival

4/24/2025 at 10:26:15 PM

Yes.

by gertop

4/24/2025 at 10:19:21 PM

This. We're car shopping right now and not only searching for non-US brands but also specific models not made in US factories.

by dismalaf

4/25/2025 at 12:19:05 AM

I don't blame you. Our next president is going to have send you a Statue of Liberty or something to patch things up.

by matthest

4/25/2025 at 9:14:49 AM

I'd rather the next president spends most of their term making sure this kind of crisis can never happen again.

We can send the statue of Shame the term after that.

by johnnyanmac

4/25/2025 at 7:50:45 AM

I absolutely won't be buying anything made in America, regardless of price. America is now an ideological enemy of the liberal Western order.

by mvdtnz

4/24/2025 at 10:36:49 PM

[flagged]

by HamsterDan

4/24/2025 at 10:12:44 PM

Not sure that it's a fair test, tbh.

I try to buy 'locally made' products because I respect the story of their company, and their efforts to build up some type of community.

If I had a choice between 'made here' or 'made there' at the checkout stage, then I'd probably think it's a bit of a scam.

I think 'locally made' is a business choice, not a product choice.

I always like to give this Welsh jeans firm as an example: https://hiutdenim.co.uk/ (sorry if it's advertising, I've no connection to them).

by gaiagraphia

4/24/2025 at 10:19:34 PM

This article is completely non-rigorous and doesn't mean anything, but it shows what "simple" thinking about problems leads to. They would have had to gather enough data points to determine the price that people would pay to be meaningful in just about any way.

This is why it's important to have academic rigor and people who study specific problems deeply in positions of power. This ignores potential economies of scale cost reductions and paying more for home made products is circularly dependent on earning more from selling those higher cost products.

I think the most interesting question by far in this space is what percent of every purchase ends up going to housing, food, or health care. If you buy a burger, what percent of the cost of that burger is going directly into housing via the workers wages?

by hayst4ck

4/24/2025 at 10:31:04 PM

> to determine the price that people would pay to be meaningful in just about any way

Not convinced that would be meaningful, but even if it was, it'd be totally useless if you can't actually manufacture items in the US with less overhead than what this company managed.

Saying "people would have bought it if it was only 35% more for the same item" is not helpful if it's not possible to profitably manufacture them at 35% more than in China.

by pixelesque

4/24/2025 at 10:52:35 PM

The greater context is tariffs. Tariffs make foreign products more expensive. If everyone is willing to pay 1% more for the benefit of their own economy, then a 1% tariff probably wouldn't be very unpopular, it might even be responsible, especially if that money is then immediately invested in helping the given industry grow.

It's a measurement of the pain of tariffs or a measurement of how many people would "willingly" pay a tariff.

Of course that assumes a low corruption government with informed and forward looking policy, rather than past looking policy. Tariffs as they are frequently exist so that our own companies don't have to compete as hard and are able to spend their money on stock buybacks rather than investing into R&D, or to choose winners and losers allowing a tariff wielding king to reward loyalty or punish dissent.

I am absolutely a layman though, and this is my layman understanding.

by hayst4ck

4/24/2025 at 11:08:23 PM

But that's tariffs on imported things, not actually manufacturing them in the USA, which is what this article is about.

by pixelesque

4/24/2025 at 11:32:27 PM

If I am willing to pay 10% more for a locally made product, then a 10% tariff has no effect on me assuming that the local company has non colluding local competitors, likewise if I am not willing to pay an 85% tariff, then an 85% tariff, which is what it would take to be locally competitive according to this, would make a product I want to buy 85% more expensive or un-purchasable.

These tariffs are somewhat about consent/mandate, nationalism, and economic policy and this story aims to be a data point, although I'm not really clear what the author wants people to conclude.

by hayst4ck

4/25/2025 at 9:25:52 AM

>If I am willing to pay 10% more for a locally made product, then a 10% tariff has no effect on me assuming that the local company has non colluding local competitors,

That's the unfortunate, greedy part of it all. Even in the purest form, if tarriffs raise prices 10%, the domestic companies will still proceed to do a price hike instead of compete in the newly level playing field. They use the opportunity and raise prices more for hopes of a larger margin. Especially in such an inflationary economy.

The customer loses out in the end because domestic companies (in this pure scenario) can't help themselves.

The impure points are more common and simply show how stupid the policies are. If you have blanket tarriffs and don't have silicon mines to take advantage of, domestic companies don't have much choice in where to get silicon. We simply don't have that resource domestically to begin with. Coffee is another common example.

by johnnyanmac

4/24/2025 at 11:05:20 PM

They didn't care to do a serious microeconomics analysis. They just wanted to go with a specific narrative.

by isaacremuant

4/25/2025 at 1:59:04 PM

This is, of course, a puff piece of writing. You don't have to look further than this phrase: _"The new unit cost us nearly 3x more to produce. To maintain our margins, we’d have to sell it for $239."_

How else does 2x become 3x, unless you're trying to make your burden sound more dramatic. uug. But what interests me in this discussion is the phrase _"maintain our margins"_. American companies off-shored manufacturing to maintain their margins. Now they have a taste of that cheap foreign labor, its oh so difficult to come back cheerfully to manufacture in the US.

> "If policymakers and pundits want to rebuild American industry, they need to grapple with this truth: idealism doesn’t always survive contact with a price tag."

Or, business' foreign labor priced margins.

by xtiansimon

4/24/2025 at 9:40:03 PM

I wonder how valid that test is, actually. Lots of people are aware that claims of "Made in USA" often don't actually mean the thing was made in the USA in the intuitive sense of the phrase and so disregard them.

Regardless, I would fully expect that most people would be swayed by price, especially when the price differential is as large as in that test.

by JohnFen

4/24/2025 at 10:06:07 PM

After so many good brand names have been hollowed out, I am extremely skeptical that “Made in America” is anything but a sticker slapped on one SKU from the same factory line.

by 0cf8612b2e1e

4/24/2025 at 10:15:24 PM

FWIW, that would be illegal -- nontrivially so.

by KerrAvon

4/25/2025 at 6:36:25 AM

However that does depend on enforcement by the FTC, whose power may be dramatically weakened.

by jerlam

4/25/2025 at 9:28:20 AM

All part of the plan. Make Grifting Great.

by johnnyanmac

4/25/2025 at 11:42:53 AM

Make America Grift Again

by ndsipa_pomu

4/24/2025 at 10:57:10 PM

Given that all products need to make that mark is to be assembled in the country its something that has clearly been manipulated as a marketing strategy too often now and its certainly a part of the issue.

by PaulKeeble

4/24/2025 at 10:22:19 PM

or Guam, Puerto Rico, and American Samoa, which are technically part of the US, but aren't, say, Kansas.

by fragmede

4/24/2025 at 9:39:00 PM

I suspect the vast majority of customers will go with the cheaper option, unless there's a quality advantage for the more expensive one (which I don't think there is in this case?).

There's also a difference between "made in" and "assembled in" in other cases (but not sure that applies in this case?).

by pixelesque

4/24/2025 at 10:33:41 PM

I favor “made in [almost any OECD state]” (not just the USA) for goods I care about and plan to have a long time precisely because it’s a decent quality marker. It doesn’t make sense to shave a few pennies on materials and processes here and there when labor’s so expensive that you can’t compete on price anyway.

If you just tell me, or imply that, “these are identically made and QC’d, and made with the same amount and quality of materials, but made in two different countries” I’ll just take the cheaper one. Especially if the price difference is as large as in this experiment, JFC.

by alabastervlog

4/25/2025 at 1:02:47 AM

For garments at least, you _can_ have affordable, Made in US by unionised labour products [1], if you cut your margins.

People complain about CoGs but let’s be real, a lot of products imported have crazy margins put on them by the middleman. You’ve probably seen “I bought this off Alibaba for $.50 and reselling for $25”

[1] https://ideologie.shop

by budududuroiu

4/24/2025 at 10:03:05 PM

Disclaimer: I don’t think the current admin policies are a good way to bring back American manufacturing, if that is their main goal.

One point I don’t see discussed much is how American physical goods companies currently don’t really have access to the huge bottom chunk of the price pyramid. This limits the benefits of scale, and makes their products more expensive than they would be otherwise.

Right now if someone starts a small physical product company in America, they pretty much have to target people with excess discretionary spending ability. Once they go for the lower part of the pyramid that is much more price sensitive, they get killed by foreign competition on labor and environmental compliance costs that the American company has to pay and the foreign company does not.

If American manufacturing ever does come back, I would expect prices to come down significantly simply due to again having access to market scale.

by pfannkuchen

4/24/2025 at 10:22:54 PM

another issue is that at least in the short term, the "made in america" sticker is likely to be detrimental in many foreign markets

so, it might make sense for US companies selling to US customers, if they can find suppliers. but even in the cases where it works for that market, multinational companies might prefer a "made in taiwan" or "made in mexico" sticker, or they might prefer to leave the sticker off

by harrison_clarke

4/24/2025 at 10:15:30 PM

In actuality the bottom chunk of the price pyramid being off limits is because of American business policy, not because of outside competition.

A staggering amount of Americans live around the poverty line and even more live paycheck to paycheck. They can only afford goods that are, effectively, priced at how much we value their labor in the US.

In order to solve this problem we'd need to actually raise the minimum wage and ensure Americans have more discretionary income to afford American products. But that'll never happen because businesses don't want to eat into their profit margins, so they just permanently lock themselves out of a market. It's a sort of tragedy of the markets issue.

by fzeroracer

4/24/2025 at 10:29:07 PM

Is the Chinese minimum wage so much better then, that China does not have this problem?

by like_any_other

4/25/2025 at 9:35:06 AM

Nope. They just have more bodies to appeal to. Especially to western companies that already captured the US/EU.

Other factors include lower cost of living, cultural factors that reduce individualism, and a semblance of basic safety nets (the ones America sucks at and is actively trying to burn the remains of). Being poor in China (or Asia in general) looks nothing like being poor in the US.

by johnnyanmac

4/26/2025 at 1:29:09 AM

I might be seriously mistaken here, but I don't believe being poor in China is better than the US. I mean, at the very outset, you can get "soft-arrested" when you are banned from travel for being in debt. And freedoms aside, there are more in poverty in China then the US.

https://www.businessinsider.com/china-social-credit-system-p...

by sadeshmukh

4/24/2025 at 10:08:41 PM

A filtering shower head is already targeting the high end discretionary consumer.

They didn’t bite.

by relaxing

4/24/2025 at 10:53:24 PM

High end discretionary consumer looking for Made in the US makes me think of something like Rogue Fitness or Room&Board. A normally Made in China/Vietnam brand specifically pointing out that they found some small third-party manufacturer that will provide the same quality you're getting from Asia (the implicit assumption is that this means low quality) is kind of priming people to not buy it.

by ndriscoll

4/25/2025 at 6:04:03 AM

Well, speaking from personal experience as a high end discretionary consumer, I buy almost exclusively products made in USA or Europe. So unless the companies I buy from have no customers other than me, there is some slice of the market where this is working today.

by pfannkuchen

4/24/2025 at 10:20:05 PM

It takes more than a slogan.

It's almost impossible to justify a significant percentage increase in price based solely on a questionable declaration of manufacturing location.

There should be a quality improvement that goes along with the location and price increase. And that used to be the impression, but I don't think that's the case anymore. "Made in the USA" used to mean that it was a quality product, not a cheap knockoff. Now the meaning is not so clear. Hasn't been for a long time.

The text says specifically that the quality is identical no matter where the product was manufactured. When people say they'd pay more for American made products, I think they mean it in the context of what that used to imply, not that they're going to pay nearly double for exactly the same quality.

by tejohnso

4/24/2025 at 10:32:34 PM

> There should be a quality improvement that goes along with the location and price increase.

> what that used to imply

This last part hits the nail on the head. The quality difference is mostly a fantasy. While the long tail of random aliexpress/temu junk suggests there's some big quality difference, it's more that those are random small businesses operating without any regulations, reputational concern, or legal liability and incentivized to make stuff cheap.

If you think about the things most people buy from real brands, the quality argument against Asia is preposterous, since not only are the products made in Asia quite high quality, but America has essentially zero slack in the skilled labor market as it is. We literally could not build a device to the quality standards of Apple or Samsung because everyone in America who could conceivably do so already has a job building cars or specialized, very expensive industrial products.

Now, people do complain that everything is crappy and made to fall apart just as the 90-365 day warranties expire. But that's not China being too dumb to make it correctly -- it's made perfectly to spec most of the time. It's the designers of the products (often in the US) optimizing their profits by using the cheapest, worst parts and unrepairable designs. If anything, moving production to a high-labor-cost country would increase the pressure to cut any corner possible.

by xp84

4/24/2025 at 10:44:24 PM

The slogan matters.

"Look for the union label" meant a lot to Americans back when there were unions.

by drewcoo

4/25/2025 at 9:42:44 AM

The slogan matters as much as the people care. Sadly there's a lot of Apathy, if not outright hate, for the fellow American as of late.

by johnnyanmac

4/24/2025 at 10:14:19 PM

Thank you sincerely for running this experiment. Unfortunately, we didn't learn anything new.

People buy cheap. They don't buy quality, they don't buy local, they don't buy green: they buy cheap.

by pif

4/24/2025 at 10:22:16 PM

It's not sincere. People in different countries do pay more for local, or ethically sourced, or other principled factors but it has to be a reasonable increase.

Putting a ridiculous, almost 2x raise in such a way and pretending it's a gotcha is disingenuous.

by isaacremuant

4/24/2025 at 10:53:15 PM

This would have been a more interesting discussion if either of you provided any actual metrics. Which this article actually does.

by rs186

4/24/2025 at 11:33:03 PM

Just because the article runs a bad experiment it doesn't mean it's conclusion is better than the critics of said experiment.

Otherwise, if I do a shitty survey and you critique it mine is better than yours because "I did something"

Every PowerPoint think tank will beat you like that.

Next time engage with a little more honesty and you might have a chance

by isaacremuant

4/25/2025 at 2:04:47 AM

Nobody said the conclusion is "better". Tons of academic papers contain faulty conclusions. But as long as it is not intentional fraud (which does get blurry at times), I appreciate researchers who put in honest work to reach some conclusion, based on evidence.

This article is also an example. You can disagree with their methodology, but I'll choose this article over posts with words like "more", "do", "don't" with no evidence attahched whatsoever.

by rs186

4/24/2025 at 10:52:30 PM

but these increases in price aren't set arbitrarily - they're calculated based on cost and profit margin. you can't just claim that a 2x price increase is ridiculous with no context.

by GuinansEyebrows

4/25/2025 at 3:00:55 AM

Well, it seems a little silly of this company to ask whether their customers would willingly bear the entire cost burden of supporting local businesses, while keeping their own profit margins just as high as ever. In a different world (one where the company owner thinks it's virtuous to buy local), they'd split the cost with the customer. That might still correspond to a 40% price increase and the conversion rate might still be zero, but at least it wouldn't be intellectually dishonest on the face of it.

by quuxplusone

4/25/2025 at 9:39:06 AM

I mean, most physical goods don't have high profit margins to begin with. Those 100% price hikes might still have thin margins if it's all done domestically. That's just the reality of spending decades removing all domestic scales of economy and giving it to China.

by johnnyanmac

4/26/2025 at 7:33:04 AM

> This wasn’t a failure of marketing—it was a referendum on price.

I don't think so. Not only is the price almost double, but there no way to discern the USA version, and the disclaimer says that some materials cannot be sourced in the USA.

A consumer that isn't price sensitive and wants made in the USA would still obviously reject this.

by sublinear

4/25/2025 at 9:57:25 AM

I absolutely pay more for local goods. In the grocery store I try to purchase things from my state, or at least adjacent states. If it’s something that will last for decades or something I will use constantly I will absolutely pay more for made in US, Canada or Mexico.

But, this study feels a bit off - as much as Americans aspire to be wealthy, the vast majority are not and have to make compromises and can’t always justify paying double for something out of some economic or emotional principle.

Of course, I learned a long time ago that “stuff” does very little for my quality of life so I try not to be acquisitive. Except for guitars, sigh.

by apercu

4/24/2025 at 11:08:19 PM

I don't understand why people are so incredulous that virtue signalling is rampant and even the "good guys" (whatever group you want to attribute that to) is mostly full of people who know the right thing to say, will gladly say it repeatedly to garner praise, but will not follow it when it comes to them.

Me, or anyone else who has tried a "virtuous venture", could have easily told this company not to waste their time. The take away here isn't "they screwed this up" or "This isn't a true test". The takeaway is "People are extremely self serving when the perceived impact is small and no one is there to judge them for it." Plan your business accordingly.

by Workaccount2

4/25/2025 at 3:46:53 AM

While not directly indicated in this article, I won't conclude that the experiment is useless. Presenting the option educates the consumer of what prices are like under tariffs.

by jhanschoo

4/25/2025 at 9:41:30 AM

Yeah, people are gawkimg at the examples and don't realize that yes, these are the legitimate costs for trying to move local immediately. You don't just "catch up" to the decades of investment China spent on manufacturing. And that catch up will be expensive.

by johnnyanmac

4/24/2025 at 10:03:18 PM

If people would spend more for the US product, we wouldn't need the tariffs.

by devenson

4/24/2025 at 10:54:50 PM

Nobody needs the current round of tariffs regardless of that. This is a completely made-up situation.

by rs186

4/25/2025 at 12:45:30 AM

JB Smuckers does. They lobbied hard for tarrifs and donated heavily to Trump.

Imported jam like Bonne Maman has been killing them. They claim it’s due to unfair pricing or something, but I suspect it’s because of the HFCS, trans fats and other crap they’ve put in their products over the years.

by hedora

4/24/2025 at 10:14:57 PM

There are other reasons businesses might go to other locales other than price. Capability is the obvious big one, some capabilities aren’t possible at any price. Regulatory environment is another.

by kasey_junk

4/24/2025 at 10:23:10 PM

We don't need the tarrifs regardless.

by dboreham

4/25/2025 at 1:59:56 AM

The choice between Made in Asia and Made in the USA can be more complicated. For instance, I will acknowledge that 85% of price difference is a lot, but then I'd rather own less stuff: less clothing, less food, certainly no goodie bags. If anything, I hate that the house is filled with stuff that family members bought for now good reason except this jolt of pleasure at the time of purchase.

by hintymad

4/24/2025 at 10:04:25 PM

I strongly suspect many items marked with things like "made proudly in the USA" type items are about to be show to have non-US sources.

by mikewarot

4/24/2025 at 10:09:12 PM

They should have lowered the cost of the USA product over multiple days to find the price point at which people would choose it.

by oniony

4/24/2025 at 10:44:43 PM

The thing is, if made in the USA does not come with a better, greener or more ethical, who cares?!

Water filtration is an area where sophisticated customers want the best filter that meets usage requirements and budgets! If you double the cost, and there’s no extra quality improvement, you’re SOL.

also: proprietary in a shower head is at best some sort of activated charcoal plus some spices. I did some reading after my sister and her husband got an osmotic filter plus de fluoridation for their pending infants. The reading gave me the take away that for good filtration you have a tough time actually doing a good job unless you’re using an osmotic filter plus filter media where the water has a long dwell time. Some of this is touched on in a recent prject farm video. Point being a filter in the shower head isn’t doing much nor efficiently.

by carterschonwald

4/25/2025 at 3:55:56 PM

"To maintain our margins, we’d have to sell it for $239."

Here we have the issue. With tariffs many companies cannot maintain their margin. So they have to reduce their greed.

That is of course absolutely terrible and the real reason why every company complains about tariffs.

No company would care about higher prices if they could maintain their margin.

by amai

4/24/2025 at 10:10:49 PM

This doesn't surprise me. As much as I would love to buy locally made products, in my economic condition I have to stretch my dollar as far as it can go. If it is the difference between buying a Dyson vs a XISXKE, well the Dyson is better for my money. But for the same shower head, that product will not scream quality unless I'm in the market to buy a higher end product. I may emotionally respond with, nobody else in the USA is supporting locally made products, why should I? I will however go out of my way to buy Canadian over American out of spite.

by T_Potato

4/24/2025 at 10:12:56 PM

Also 'crapification'. I currently have a low amount of trust of product quality wherever it might be manufactured.

by T_Potato

4/24/2025 at 11:05:25 PM

I’m honestly surprised so many comments here are nitpicking or expressing skepticism about this little test.

Low price vs foreign sourcing has been tested trillions of times over decades and low price largely won. How do you think we got to the supply chains and economy we have today? How do you think Walmart (which started off selling Made in USA BTW) and Dollar Tree and Target and Amazon etc. got so big?

People like low prices. They like them more than a lot of other things they also like.

by snowwrestler

4/25/2025 at 2:41:19 AM

We got to the supply chains and economy we have today through a large number of free trade deals, whose opponents correctly predicted that they would drive a low price vs. foreign sourcing dynamic eventually leaving domestic manufacturing uncompetitive for many products. I'm not skeptical of the test results at all.

by SpicyLemonZest

4/24/2025 at 10:16:43 PM

I imagine zero people care about the manufacturing provenance of their shower-head and many other household utility items. This is just hot-button-issue glommering marketing fluff.

FWIW, such country-of-origin labels are largely misleading when it comes to most durable goods which, by design, are made up of an amalgam of parts sourced from multiple supply chains.

by calmbonsai

4/25/2025 at 3:14:25 AM

I would pay more for "made in the usa", but it usually goes along with a trusted brand, and usually for a product with decent design and durability.

Think snap-on hand tools or darn-touch socks.

There are plenty of brands that don't have much meaning behind them though, having cut costs or sold out.

by m463

4/24/2025 at 11:56:19 PM

It seems to me that this is not a fair test. There is sentiment and there is budget. A product that costs a little more is one thing but double the price hits budget barriers. Most people do not have 80%+ discretionary budget.

by rietta

4/24/2025 at 10:40:37 PM

Everytime I think of made in USA, I'm reminded of Americans Italian and Irish mobs racking up prices on repairs of everything from cars to appliances so high that it even drove people into the streets.

by wrongcarewhy

4/24/2025 at 10:56:14 PM

I would pay more (up to the budget) if I knew I was getting a better product. I don't care where it was made.

by rascul

4/24/2025 at 10:12:28 PM

I wonder if the strikethrough had any subtle influence on the decision making

by theflyestpilot

4/24/2025 at 10:12:28 PM

> Our bestselling model—manufactured in Asia (China and Vietnam)—sells for $129. But this year, as tariffs jumped from 25% to 170%, we wondered: Could we reshore manufacturing to the U.S. while maintaining margins to keep our lights on?

This is disingenuous. According to Amazon price tracking, the price was $129 in 2024 as well, so they are apparently not maintaining margins on the China made product.

by ac29

4/24/2025 at 10:48:47 PM

The question wasn’t “can we maintain our margin,” the question was “can we manufacture in the US with the same margin we used to enjoy?”

The whole thing is a stunt designed to focus ire against tariffs, but let’s not mischaracterize their point: manufacturing in the US is much more expensive than manufacturing in Asia.

by jdlshore

4/24/2025 at 10:13:37 PM

Given how gutted the regulatory agencies are today, I wouldn’t be surprised if we see surge in fraudulent claims of “Made in USA” items that actually trace manufacturing to another country.

Maybe “Made in USA, China”

by xyst

4/24/2025 at 10:20:09 PM

No surprise with this test except a few people from the US bought made in USA. That was a bit of a surprise.

by jmclnx

4/25/2025 at 1:47:03 AM

I honestly believe if the Trump administration really intends to bring manufactuing back to the US, a permanent double-digit/3-digit tariff and a stable regime of 8+ years will do the trick. Companies will be able to plan accordingly.

But, if the tariff keeps changing on a daily basis with no one sure of his ultimate goal, and the fact that there is a four-year term limit which significant limits visibility beyond that, companies couldn't make such decision. It takes more than four years to build a factory and get it into stable operations.

by Gathering6678

4/25/2025 at 1:57:11 AM

> a four-year term limit

Apparently Trump doesn't think so.

by minebreaker

4/24/2025 at 10:11:24 PM

My understanding of what Trump is trying is forcing us to have no choice by making both versions insanely overpriced with overseas being more

by zombiwoof

4/24/2025 at 10:10:29 PM

MAGA and Trump don’t even make their hats in America

It’s all one big con

by zombiwoof

4/25/2025 at 12:54:08 AM

Trump does make the offical MAGA hats in the USA. Random people can and do import hats to sell at rallies and the like.

by vanattab

4/24/2025 at 10:21:02 PM

"Everyone"?

by dboreham

4/24/2025 at 9:47:53 PM

That's not an A/B test, it's a choice. A/B means, each one is displayed to different customers as the only option to then see who wanted what.

In this case, a choice is more insightful than A/B.

What I find more interesting is that people give a shit about shower heads.

by Haeuserschlucht

4/24/2025 at 10:05:12 PM

I think it is an A/B test, as you described, based on this part:

> We created a secret landing page. The product and design were identical. The only difference? One was labeled “Made in Asia” and priced at $129. The other, “Made in the USA,” at $239.

It's odd that they changed the text AND nearly doubled the price. They seem to attribute the conversion rate dropping to the text change, though.

by bqmjjx0kac

4/24/2025 at 10:11:39 PM

The post is unclear on this. I'm not sure where the "secret landing page" came into play here. They even show a screenshot with both options visible.

And they also say: "The visitors were given the choice to either buy the Made in USA or the Made in Asia version."

A/B would be randomly showing either ONLY the USA with higher price to some people and ONLY the cheaper Asian one to others.

However, even that isn't apples to apples as the price is obviously different.

by bangaladore

4/25/2025 at 2:57:28 AM

I'm assuming they mean "in aggregate, visitors were shown both options" rather than "each visitor was shown both options".

by bqmjjx0kac

4/25/2025 at 3:18:59 AM

They might mean it, but between the very clear language in the sentence and the screenshot they provided, I doubt it.

Seems more likely they don't understand A/B.

by bangaladore

4/25/2025 at 3:57:04 AM

Ah, you're totally right. The screenshot has radio buttons for selecting one of the two shower heads.

by bqmjjx0kac

4/24/2025 at 10:53:54 PM

I've been amazed recently by 2 shower heads. My grandmas shower has VERY low water output from the lower spigot, but flowing through the showerhead you would never know it. They replaced a showerhead at the gym recently and the flow/coverage is amazing. I want one like that in my next house, or maybe this one lol.

by loco5niner

4/25/2025 at 12:05:03 AM

It consistently amazes me how much other people seem to not give a shit about appliances/tools. Everything seems to be low-lifespan garbage or have a fatal flaw or be over-featured and inconvenient to use or have inexplicable design. It seems like even the businesses who are actually trying still have issues - like all generational knowledge is gone.

by happytoexplain

4/24/2025 at 10:05:42 PM

One of the first lessons people learn in many fields and walks of life: People's declared preferences are often radically opposed to their revealed preferences.

by EA-3167

4/24/2025 at 10:36:54 PM

"Revealed preferences" should really be called "revealed behaviors".

"Sure this alcoholic says he wants to quit booze, but when we put a discount liquor shelf at the checkout where he shops for groceries, he started buying whiskey again. What a hypocrite!"

by like_any_other

4/24/2025 at 10:55:59 PM

I don’t want to eat a ton of junk food. That’s why I buy little of it.

But if it’s around, yeah, I’ll eat tons of it.

“Revealed preference! Actually you wanted to eat a ton of junk food! You were lying to yourself!” No, I actually don’t want to, in fucking fact.

by alabastervlog

4/24/2025 at 10:12:22 PM

Is there a way to successfully and repeatedly screen for this?

by no_wizard

4/24/2025 at 10:18:28 PM

Judge people on what they do not what they say. Or did you mean something else?

by masfuerte

4/24/2025 at 10:18:58 PM

I meant from a business and market research perspective

by no_wizard

4/24/2025 at 11:18:11 PM

> from a market research perspective

The generally accepted answer is that the only way to know for sure that people will buy something is to get them to pay you money or get them to commit to pay you money.

This falls broadly under the concept of the "lean startup" where you focus first on proving you can sell what you intend to build, and only build it after you have cash commitments from customers to buy what you intend to build.

The logic behind lean startup is that it's far more likely your startup will fail because no one will pay (or pay enough) for what you want to build than it is likely to fail because you can't actually build the thing you want to build. The later case is of course possible, but in practice far more startups fail because of lack of sales than from lack of technology.

by yodon

4/24/2025 at 10:26:45 PM

As far as I'm aware the only thing that works is very skilled use of focus groups and market research, although something similar exists in the world of politics too. At the end of the day though it's tough, people are often unaware of the disconnect in themselves, we are rationalizing machines after all. In areas where feedback from some kind of market is lacking, it's a hard problem to solve.

Economists deal with this a lot, and being economists they create models or modify existing models to account for this gap. That certainly seems to work, to an extent, but only when applied to populations rather than individuals.

On a less academic note this is a major problem for science that relies on surveys, because even when anonymous people have an awareness that they're "speaking" to someone and being "judged" in some way. People, even in that moment alone with a survey, want to reinforce the image they have of themselves. When asked by a survey, "What do you want from a new newspaper?" Very few people respond, "Celebrities, scandals, and lewd pictures." People often skew to asking for thoughtful, long-form, in-depth reporting.

BUT... then they buy tabloids and click on bait, and they don't read the complex, nuanced, long-form stuff. If they aren't even consciously aware of that, short of getting them in a behavioral lab, how do you tease that out of them? Well structuring survey questions with redundant questions phrased differently can help, you can get a sense of someone's overall "sentiment" for example, but it's still limited for the reasons described above.

A few interesting examples from :

https://scholar.harvard.edu/files/laibson/files/how_are_pref...

https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/36434890/

https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S00472...

by EA-3167

4/25/2025 at 8:01:06 AM

>On a less academic note this is a major problem for science that relies on surveys, because even when anonymous people have an awareness that they're "speaking" to someone and being "judged" in some way. People, even in that moment alone with a survey, want to reinforce the image they have of themselves. When asked by a survey, "What do you want from a new newspaper?" Very few people respond, "Celebrities, scandals, and lewd pictures." People often skew to asking for thoughtful, long-form, in-depth reporting.

>BUT... then they buy tabloids and click on bait, and they don't read the complex, nuanced, long-form stuff.

I think this is a solid post overall. That said FWIW, I'll add that I think there can be a further legitimate further layer to this: people can express wishes for how the world would be as part of a desire to change themselves too even while failing to reach it (or reach it entirely) and that's not necessarily bad or wrong. Ie, one of the most effective ways to avoid things like junkfood or alcohol is to make it even mildly more inconvenient by just not having it in your house in the first place. If you're hit by a craving, and whatever it is is right on hand, then odds are vastly higher that you'll indulge said craving whether your higher order processes think that's a good idea or not. It's easily to rationalize, you already spent the money on it. But some care around yourself and further habits (like going shopping after a meal, people tend to buy far less impulse if they're feeling full then very hungry) can help create an environment that is more conducive to making the right choices. I don't think it's purely a matter of willpower.

So in a survey that invokes "how would you like the world to be?" sorts of questions I don't think it can simply be dismissed as "revealed preference" (though that can also be very important!) or hypocrisy if some people wish the world was different even if they deal with the world as it is, or if they wish there were fewer temptations or more powerful/effective tools to deal with them even if they do tend to give into temptations. It's precisely because temptations are tempting that someone might wish to make them more difficult right? Like, I don't think it'd be necessarily wrong or strange if an alcoholic supported higher alcohol taxes or fewer locations or whatever.

Again, not to disagree that sometimes people absolutely are saying things they don't really mean out of concern of judgement or the like, just further agreeing that it's really complex to tease it all out.

by xoa

4/24/2025 at 10:37:59 PM

If there were, it would replace jury selection.

by drewcoo

4/24/2025 at 10:27:02 PM

It is a whole field of research, e.g. in the food industry or in polling. You have to get creative in your setup.

Keywords to search for are "implicit" vs. "explicit" preferences

by aredox

4/24/2025 at 10:18:02 PM

Omniscience?

by tmpz22

4/24/2025 at 10:39:46 PM

Aside: why is all the science against omniscience?

by drewcoo

4/24/2025 at 10:07:07 PM

Ask people with long hair how they feel about showerheads. It reveals a subgroup of users who tend to be more attentive out of self-interest.

by altairprime

4/24/2025 at 10:50:04 PM

[flagged]

by rs186