Tariff Update: Whatever Happened to the Emblem Company Setting Sail for the Dominican Republic?

In March 2025, about a week before Trump held up his “Liberation Day” chart showing discrete reciprocal tariffs on 180 countries, IndustryWeek profiled three manufacturers and shared their take on the tariff uncertainty. One of those was World Emblem, a U.S.-based embroidered-patch manufacturer for apparel and uniform companies, including Levi's and Cintas, that employed 1,200 people.

World Emblem saw an opening in the market where embroidery makers in Asia could not deliver product to U.S. customers within days. The company created a business model where 850 of its 1200 were located in Mexico—with smaller operations  in Norcross, Georgia, Houston and in China and Vietnam—to keep labor costs low and also take advantage of the de minimis rule where shipments under $800 were exempt from tariffs.

That model was upended when the Trump administration announced the elimination of the de minimis rule and additional tariffs on Mexico.

World Emblem CEO Randy Carr told IndustryWeek back then that with the tariff announcements, he was considering moving some Mexico production to other countries in Central America, including possibly the Dominican Republic. Yet a week later came Trump’s reciprocal tariffs, which included even tiny island nations like the Dominican Republic.

We checked back with World Emblem and found that the Dominican Republic facility has yet to open, but instead of moving jobs from Mexico, the plan is to hire additional workers when a plant does open there.

Meanwhile, while the bulk of World Emblem’s production is still in Mexico, the company just doubled its manufacturing space in Houston, from 35,000 to 72,000 square feet, and reshored 50 jobs in Houston from Asia.

Carr explained in an email why his company shifted the production from Asia to the U.S.:

“First, control – When you manufacture 8–10 time zones away, you lose visibility. Quality drifts. Lead times expand.  In our business, where brand detail and on-time performance matter, control is margin.

“Second, speed: Our customers don’t want 60–90-day pipelines. They want three days. Sometimes less. Producing in Houston lets us compress cycle times, reduce inventory risk and respond in real time. That directly improves delivery performance and cash flow.

"Third, structural risk: Between tariffs, freight volatility, geopolitical instability, and supply chain shocks, the old low-cost Asia model isn’t low-risk anymore. When you factor in shipping, duties, rework, and delay costs, the gap narrows fast.  We’re reshoring because automation, AI, and advanced manufacturing allow us to produce competitively in the U.S. with higher quality and shorter lead times.”