U.S. footwear producers are urging President Donald Trump to invest in the future of the sector using revenue from the administration’s global tariff scheme.
On Monday, the U.S. Footwear Manufacturers Association (USFMA) sent an open letter to the president saying that duties on goods made overseas should be used to bolster the growth of American industry and the expansion of a national shoe supply chain.
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According to the group’s executive director, Bill McCann, “American footwear manufacturing is poised for significant growth,” but the country’s manufacturers need aid in the form of funding and subsidies from the federal government to scale operations and pull market share away from foreign competitors.
As it stands, American manufacturers account for about 25 million of the 2.7 billion pairs of shoes sold in the U.S. every year, meaning that they’re capturing less than 1 percent of the domestic market. USFMA aims to see U.S. makers produce at least 5 percent, or 135 million pairs, annually.
The trade group believes success hinges on intervention from Washington, with McCann writing that “a one-time federal investment” of $5 billion would be enough to jumpstart the momentum the sector needs to build toward that goal. The infusion of capital would generate thousands of direct and indirect manufacturing jobs, and the logistics sector would also receive more business as in-country commerce grows.
Funneling funding into footwear production would help grow the industry’s onshore supply chain and ensure its resilience—an objective manufacturers have already been working together to achieve, he said.
“Long-established footwear manufacturers are reinvesting in domestic operations, and a new generation of entrepreneurs and startups are entering the industry with energy and innovation,” McCann wrote. “Advances in materials and manufacturing processes, such as AI-powered automation and additive manufacturing, are helping to level the global playing field for American footwear manufacturers.”
But rebuilding the industry and advancing a new generation of innovators requires “significant capital investment, particularly in state-of-the-art manufacturing equipment,” McCann added. A portion of tariff revenue generated through taxes on imports from other countries should be “strategically reinvested to match private sector capital” in order to modernize the footwear supply chain with advanced technologies.