{"id":14237,"date":"2025-08-13T09:00:00","date_gmt":"2025-08-13T09:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/skybeaconnews.com\/index.php\/2025\/08\/13\/heritage-comes-at-a-steep-price-for-this-oklahoma-denim-maker\/"},"modified":"2025-08-15T14:33:46","modified_gmt":"2025-08-15T14:33:46","slug":"heritage-comes-at-a-steep-price-for-this-oklahoma-denim-maker","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/skybeaconnews.com\/index.php\/2025\/08\/13\/heritage-comes-at-a-steep-price-for-this-oklahoma-denim-maker\/","title":{"rendered":"Heritage comes at a steep price for this Oklahoma denim-maker"},"content":{"rendered":"

In the quiet town of Shawnee, Oklahoma, the rapid whir of sewing machines fills one of the last surviving American garment factories. Inside, denim from 100% American cotton is cut and sewn by hand into jeans, with a \u201cMade in USA\u201d tag stitched into every pair.<\/p>\n

Founded in 1903, Round House Jeans is Oklahoma\u2019s oldest manufacturer. Vice President David Antosh, whose family has run the company for over six decades, describes making affordable American-made jeans as both his family\u2019s heritage and a way to support his community. <\/p>\n

\u201cOur No. 1 goal here at Round House Jeans is to make affordable American-made jeans that the average American can buy,\u201d explained Antosh, who prices his denim pants at just $70 a pair and says he pays his employees above-market wages. It\u2019s a vision that comes at a high cost and low return. <\/p>\n

\u201cOur profit margins are extremely low,\u201d Antosh admitted about his American factory. \u201cWe make hardly any money on these jeans.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"Jeans
Founded in 1903, Round House Jeans is Oklahoma\u2019s oldest manufacturer.TODAY<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

The company embodies a lot of President Donald Trump\u2019s \u201cAmerica first\u201d economic ethos, but it\u2019s also an example of how hard it\u2019ll be for the president to compel clothing manufacturers to move operations to the United States. Despite higher tariffs intended to reshore manufacturing, scarce and costly skilled labor, limited domestic materials, and outdated technology have made manufacturing overseas both cheaper and more efficient.<\/p>\n

Antosh acknowledged he also sells jeans sewn in Bangladesh at far higher margins. He said the higher profits from those imported jeans subsidize the price of his American-made products and pay for his Shawnee factory. <\/p>\n

A pair of American-made jeans that Round House sells for $70 carries a 5% margin or less, meaning they cost above $66 to produce. By comparison, apparel retailers typically aim for at least 30% margin on products, according to Anna Livermore, CEO of V. Mora, a fashion consulting firm. Many target margins well above that, she said.<\/p>\n

Antosh said his biggest challenge is building his sewing workforce. With so few U.S. apparel companies still operating, experienced workers are hard to find. He trains every new hire from scratch, which is a process that can take months or years before they\u2019re fully productive. \u201cIt\u2019s a very highly skilled job that requires a lot of patience, a lot of learning,\u201d he said. <\/p>\n

\"Jeans
A pair of American-made jeans that Round House sells for $70 carries a 5% margin or less, meaning they cost above $66 to produce.TODAY<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Despite the above-market pay attracting plenty of applicants, about three-quarters of new hires quit within the first few months, unable to handle the demands of the job. <\/p>\n

By contrast, his Bangladesh-sewn jeans, which are still made with 100% American cotton, sell for $40 a pair, nearly half the price of the U.S.-made version, but deliver far higher margins of 20%. <\/p>\n

Round House has been hesitant to raise prices on its American-made jeans, both out of principle and fear of the consequences. \u201cEvery time we have a price increase, we hear from customers who say I\u2019d love to buy American-made but can no longer afford it,\u201d Antosh said. He has seen competitors go out of business after price hikes drove customers away. According to a Conference Board survey released Monday, the appeal of \u201cMade in USA\u201d has faded since 2022, as many Americans now link it to higher costs amid higher price sensitivity. <\/p>\n

Among the top goals for Trump and his administration in hitting trading partners with steep tariffs is bringing manufacturing capacity back to the U.S., even if it comes at the price of short-term market and economic duress. But Antosh said tariffs won\u2019t help his company.<\/p>\n

\"Jeans
Round House has been hesitant to raise prices on its American-made jeans, out of both principle and fear of the consequences. TODAY<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s a hardship for us,\u201d Antosh said. \u201cWhen jeans sewn outside the U.S. become more expensive from tariffs, we can\u2019t subsidize our American-made jeans as much and their price must go up, meaning fewer customers can afford Made-in-USA.\u201d<\/p>\n

Clothing imports already faced tariffs of 12%-17% before Trump\u2019s presidency, according to the United States Fashion Industry Association. An additional 20% reciprocal tariff on Bangladeshi products, which became effective Aug. 7, would chip away at Round House\u2019s profits. But even with the added tariffs, producing jeans in Bangladesh still costs far less than in the U.S. Antosh maintained that even with a hypothetical 100% tariff, Bangladeshi production would still come out cheaper than making the same jeans in Oklahoma. <\/p>\n

Only 2.5% of clothing sold in America is produced domestically, according to AllAmerican.org, a U.S. manufacturing advocacy group. The rest is imported from places like China, Vietnam, India and Bangladesh, where labor is much cheaper. In the 1990s, U.S. apparel factories employed almost a million people. Today, that number has dropped below 100,000.<\/p>\n

The U.S. lacks the capacity, materials and technology to meet fashion companies\u2019 sourcing needs, said Sheng Lu, a professor of fashion and apparel studies at the University of Delaware. He also sees no clear evidence that tariff policies have driven fashion companies to source more domestically. In his 2025 Fashion Industry Benchmarking Study, over 80% of apparel companies said they plan to diversify sourcing to offset tariffs, while just 17% expect to increase sourcing from the U.S.<\/p>\n

\"Jeans
Vice President David Antosh said his biggest challenge is building his sewing workforce. With so few U.S. apparel companies still operating, experienced workers are hard to find.TODAY<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Another challenge for U.S. apparel manufacturing is its inability to produce a wide range of goods, said Joseph Ng, CEO of Shift Fashion Group, a consultancy that works with manufacturers. Aside from a handful of luxury brands, most U.S.-made apparel is limited to basic items like T-shirts, hoodies and socks, due to the fact that American factories \u201cdon\u2019t have the skill set, machinery or materials to make anything beyond that,\u201d Ng explained.<\/p>\n

Ng pointed to Louis Vuitton\u2019s Texas factory as an example of how brands attempting more complex products face steep challenges. Opened in 2019 during Trump\u2019s first presidency, the luxury brand\u2019s facility produces designer handbags but has a defect rate far higher than the industry norm, making it the company\u2019s worst-performing facility, according to a report from Reuters. <\/p>\n

To stay in business, Round House keeps things simple. \u201cWe don\u2019t chase the latest fashion,\u201d Antosh said. \u201cWe\u2019re always about making things very similar to how we always have, even 100 years ago.\u201d Chasing fast-changing fashion trends, he said, would require frequent retraining, making U.S. production inefficient and unsustainable.<\/p>\n

Round House\u2019s slim U.S. margins leave little room for error, Ng said. <\/p>\n

\u201cIf he only had that business, he\u2019d be one mess-up away from going out of business,\u201d Ng cautioned, noting that garment manufacturing has multiple potential points of failure. A single mistake, such as misplacing rivets on a batch of jeans, could wipe out what little profit there is.<\/p>\n

But Antosh said the goal has never been about maximizing profits. His focus is on preserving his family company\u2019s heritage, keeping American manufacturing alive and sustaining his community with good jobs. As a testament to his commitment to his employees, many of his workers have stuck around for decades.<\/p>\n

\u201cThere\u2019s very few factories like ours that still exist,\u201d Antosh said. \u201cI don\u2019t know if anyone else could be making affordable American-made jeans, like we do. That\u2019s our reason for existence. If we weren\u2019t here, offering it at this price point, who would be?\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Aug. 13, 2025, 5:00 AM EDTIn the quiet town of Shawnee, Oklahoma, the rapid whir of sewing machines fills one of the last surviving American garment factories. Inside, denim from 100% American cotton is cut and sewn by hand into jeans, with a \u201cMade in USA\u201d tag stitched into every pair.
\nFounded in 1903, Round House Jeans is Oklahoma\u2019s oldest manufacturer. Vice President David Antosh, whose family has run the company for over six decades, describes making affordable American-made jeans as both his family\u2019s heritage and a way to support his community.
\n\u201cOur No. 1 goal here at Round House Jeans is to make affordable American-made jeans that the average American can buy,\u201d explained Antosh, who prices his denim pants at just $70 a pair and says he pays his employees above-market wages. It\u2019s a vision that comes at a high cost and low return.
\n\u201cOur profit margins are extremely low,\u201d Antosh admitted about his American factory. \u201cWe make hardly any money on these jeans.\u201d
\nFounded in 1903, Round Ho..<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":14238,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[17,25],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-14237","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-tie-business","category-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/skybeaconnews.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14237","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/skybeaconnews.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/skybeaconnews.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/skybeaconnews.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/skybeaconnews.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=14237"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/skybeaconnews.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14237\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":14243,"href":"https:\/\/skybeaconnews.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14237\/revisions\/14243"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/skybeaconnews.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/14238"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/skybeaconnews.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=14237"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/skybeaconnews.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=14237"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/skybeaconnews.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=14237"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}