Reshoring is when a company brings manufacturing back to its home country after years of making things abroad. For most of the last thirty years, the trade went the other way, and factories followed cheap labor to wherever it was cheapest.
That habit is breaking down. Tariffs can change in a week, a container can spend six weeks crossing an ocean it used to cross in three, and one shutdown in a supplier’s city can leave a production line idle halfway around the world. More and more manufacturers have started asking whether it’s time to build closer to the people who actually buy their products.
This piece, from the team at Global Industries Intelligence, walks through what reshoring and nearshoring mean, how they compare with offshoring, and why the shift is picking up speed now.
What Is Reshoring?
A plain reshoring definition would be this: production that was moved overseas comes back to the company’s home market.
Take a US appliance brand that has built washers in China since the late 2000s. If it shuts that line and restarts it in Kentucky, it has reshored. The reshoring meaning itself hasn’t changed in years; what has changed is the number of firms willing to pay for it.
The Reshoring Initiative, which tracks this closely, counted about 244,000 US manufacturing jobs announced through reshoring and foreign direct investment in 2024. The 2025 figure landed in roughly the same place, and the group’s mid-year projection for 2026 is around 309,000. Announced jobs aren’t filled jobs, and some projects never get built. Still, those numbers would have sounded far-fetched ten years ago.
What Is Nearshoring?
Nearshoring sits between staying far away and coming all the way home. Production moves to a neighboring country, usually one with a shared border, a similar time zone or a trade deal that keeps duties low.
In North America, the nearshoring meaning usually translates to one word: Mexico. A US brand that pulls assembly out of Vietnam and sets it up in Monterrey hasn’t come home, but its goods now arrive by truck in days instead of by ship in weeks. Mexico overtook China as America’s biggest trading partner in 2023, and around $40 billion of foreign investment flowed into the country in 2025.
European firms do the same thing on their own map, shifting work from Asia toward Poland, Romania, Turkey, or Morocco.
How Does Reshoring Differ From Nearshoring and Offshoring?
It helps to start with offshoring, since that’s where most of this began. Offshoring means moving production to a distant country, mainly to cut labor costs. Onshoring is a bit different: it describes production that’s built at home in the first place. It sits close to reshoring, except nothing was ever sent away.
| Approach | Where Production Goes | Why Companies Choose It | What It Costs Them |
| Offshoring | A distant, low-cost country | Cheaper labor and production | Long lead times, tariff exposure |
| Reshoring | Back to the home country | Control, speed, fewer duties | Higher wages |
| Nearshoring | A neighboring country | A mix of lower cost and proximity | Still a border to cross |
| Onshoring | Home country from day one | Being near customers | Bigger upfront investment |
Nearshoring vs Offshoring
Labor rates usually favor offshoring. Nearly everything else favors nearshoring: shipping time, overlapping working hours, the ability to put an engineer on a plane in the morning and have them back by dinner. When your supplier is three hours behind you, a problem gets sorted the same afternoon. At twelve hours, you’re waiting until tomorrow.
For a long time, the onshore vs offshore question was settled by the wage gap and little else. That’s no longer how most finance teams run the numbers. They look at the full picture, including duties, freight, stock sitting in transit, quality failures and what it costs when a shipment shows up late.
You’ll also hear about friendshoring, which means moving production to allied countries regardless of how far away they are. Distance matters less there than politics and trust.
Why Are Manufacturers Doing It Now?
People have been talking about reshoring manufacturing since at least the early 2010s, and for years the talk outran the action. What changed is that several pressures showed up together instead of one at a time.
Tariffs are the loudest of them. US duties have risen sharply since 2025 and keep moving, so a quote that looked cheap in January can look expensive by March. The Reshoring Initiative says tariffs now come up as a reason for moving production far more often than they did a few years back.
Costs have shifted as well. Wages in China and other traditional low-cost hubs have climbed for years, while automation has shrunk the share of labor in total cost for many products. There’s still a gap, just a smaller one.
Then there are delays. Ships rerouted around the Red Sea, drought limits on the Panama Canal and jammed ports have all stretched delivery times, which means more inventory tied up and slower reactions when demand changes.
And finally, risk. Leaning on one far-off region for critical parts proved a bigger bet than most leadership teams had assumed. A shorter reshoring supply chain is simply easier to see into and easier to fix.
All of this sits within broader supply chain trends, but for a plant manager the question tends to be practical and specific: where should this particular product be built from next year onward?
What Are the Benefits of Reshoring and Nearshoring?
The benefits of reshoring and nearshoring overlap quite a bit, though the mix isn’t identical.
Bringing production home usually means shorter lead times and a quicker answer when a big customer changes an order. It cuts exposure to import duties. Quality problems get spotted and solved on the floor rather than over video calls. Designs are harder to copy, and some buyers, particularly in government and defense, actively prefer locally made goods.
Nearshoring benefits look a little different. Labor stays cheaper than at home, shipping is a fraction of the time from Asia, and teams share working hours. In North America, products that meet USMCA’s rules of origin can also cross borders duty-free.
There’s a quieter advantage too. With fewer handoffs and shorter routes, supply chain traceability gets far simpler, and knowing exactly where a component came from stops being a detective job.
Reshoring Examples: GE Appliances
GE Appliances offers one of the clearest reshoring examples of the last couple of years. In June 2025, it committed $490 million to move washing machine production from China to its Appliance Park site in Louisville, Kentucky. The plan adds 800 jobs, and production is due to start in early 2027.
In August, it followed with a five-year plan worth more than $3 billion across five states. Gas range production moves from Mexico to Georgia, several refrigerator models move from China to Alabama, and over 1,000 jobs are expected along the way.
CEO Kevin Nolan said some of these moves were on the drawing board before the latest tariffs, but trade tensions made them more urgent. He also said lean manufacturing, upskilling and automation are what make the math work for US production. In other words, bringing the work home only pays if the plant runs tightly, with habits like a regular gemba walk built into how managers spend their week.
What Does This Mean for Manufacturing Teams?
Relocating a line is the straightforward part. The harder work is running it well, which often means finding people who know automation, lean methods and quality systems faster than the local labor market can supply them. Planners also need to rethink stock levels, supplier lists and capacity for shorter, faster cycles. If you’re mapping those skill needs, our Training portfolio shows the operations and maintenance areas manufacturers are prioritizing.
Reshoring and nearshoring aren’t a retreat from global trade. They’re a bet that closer, simpler operations will hold up better in a world that keeps throwing surprises. If you’re getting your team ready for that shift, fill out our In-house Registration form or contact us now.
Frequently Asked Questions
What’s the difference between reshoring and onshoring?
Reshoring brings back work that was moved overseas. Onshoring describes production that was based at home from the start.
Is nearshoring cheaper than reshoring?
On wages, usually yes. Once duties, shipping time, and inventory costs are added, the difference often shrinks.
Which industries are reshoring most?
In the US, recent activity has been led by electronics, electrical equipment such as EV batteries and solar, and transportation equipment.
What skills do plants need after reshoring?
Automation, maintenance, lean, and quality skills are in the shortest supply. Some companies back this up with structured training and development certifications for supervisors and technicians.
Where can managers learn more about running a reshored plant?
Operations, planning, and leadership topics are often covered in business training programs built for plant and production managers.
