The Reshoring movement is gaining momentum as recent surveys show that a majority of U.S. manufacturers have either reshored or are actively evaluating reshoring portions of their production. President Trump’s tariffs are only one factor in the increase of reshoring. According to The Reshoring Initiative, the most common incentives for reshoring include shorter lead times, higher product quality and consistency, lower inventory levels, better responsiveness to changing customer demands, minimal intellectual property theft risk, and improved innovation and product differentiation.:
Data from the Reshoring Initiative shows “As of November 2025, we have recorded over 7600 cases of manufacturing companies that have brought work back to the U.S and from 2010 through November 2025. 2.3 million jobs returned from offshore vis reshoring and FDI.” This article will discuss why reshoring IT services is also critical to the success of American manufacturers and the protection of our national security.
The idea for this topic was presented to me by David Vickery, President of IT GuidePoint Corporation (or IT GuidePoint) who is a fellow member of the Coalition for a Prosperous America whom I used to see on our monthly member calls. He has been reading my blog articles regularly and contacted me after reading my previous article about Marlin Steel Wire Products. We met via Zoom last Wednesday and discussed why it is critical to reshore IT services.
David said, “I founded IT GuidePoint Corporation in May of 2008 after a decade as a principal at a publicly traded consulting firm in the Midwest that focused on $50 to $500 million manufacturing and distribution companies. My company focuses on Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP) software optimization and new software selection for manufacturing and distribution companies mostly in the Midwest states of Illinois, Iowa, and Indiana. Let’s say you have a bad implementation and you need someone to review it and help you go through and say, why isn’t it working for us? The business system that you use on your computer to enter orders, ship things, check inventory, run the lines through the manufacturing plant all connects in some way, shape, or form to your planning or ERP system. I like to use the word business system because most people because most people just can’t get their arms around ERP unless they’re in the industry. I work with a network of specialized consultants, including former CIOs and CFOs, to provide practical solutions for clients facing challenges with their business systems.”
He told me, “I believe that your latest article has the same core principle highlighting the value of full domestic self-sufficiency. At least, that is my view because it is a repeated theme in your articles that America must stop outsourcing critical production and become self-reliant with no more depending on China for steel, baskets, chips, printed circuit boards, etc. I’m trying to take that message into the digital realm discussion: ERP and IT systems are now the “nervous system” of every modern manufacturer. Outsourcing those services to non-US citizens creates the same national security, IP, and supply-chain vulnerabilities that David Greenblatt warns about with physical goods. Defining “Made in the USA services” to require USA-citizen ERP/IT resources is simply completing the self-sufficiency picture you already champion.”
David shared his experience from MBA school in the 1990s, where a professor accurately predicted that outsourcing would eventually affect white-collar jobs, similar to how it had impacted blue-collar manufacturing jobs. He mentioned reading an Economic Policy Institute report that said “By 2010, trade deficits with Mexico had eliminated 682,900 good U.S. jobs, most (60.8 percent) in manufacturing.”
I mentioned that a 2017 Economic Policy report stated, “Growth in U.S.–China trade deficit between 2001 and 2015 cost 3.4 million jobs.
He emphasized how the hollowing out of rural manufacturing towns leads to broader economic decline, affecting everything from infrastructure to educational systems when major manufacturing plants leave. He said that he wrote an article called Rural Manufacturing Perspective that talks about the little town that he grew up in where manufacturing and agriculture together kept the town going because it has a ripple effect. He said, “When a major manufacturing plant goes away, it can destroy a town. When you hollow out Main Street, you hollow out the churches, you hollow out the infrastructure, the educational system, the police, and the fire department.”
I told him that I understood what he was saying as I wrote blog articles about small towns in North and South Carolina that were nearly destroyed by losing their furniture and textile industries. Everything gets hollowed out because you don’t have tax payers and the local businesses don’t have customers. Both of us agreed that the loss of these jobs in rural America is particularly crushing because there’s no other options for these people.
David mentioned that Deloitte’s 2026 manufacturing industry outlook predicted companies are going to invest another 20% in domestic computer systems. David said, “I’m trying to take that message into the digital realm discussion: ERP and IT systems are now the “nervous system” of every modern manufacturer. Outsourcing those services to non-US citizens creates the same national security, IP, and supply-chain vulnerabilities that David Greenblatt of Marlin Steel warned about with physical goods. There is a security risk when you outsource your ERP and IT systems, which are basically the brains of your business, Intellectual Property, trade secrets, and all that kind of stuff. You have to be really, really careful about who gets access to that information and from what country
He added, “Defining ‘Made in the USA services’ to require USA-citizen ERP/IT resources is simply completing the self-sufficiency picture you already champion. Modern Manufacturing firms like Marlin Steel depend on a sophisticated software implementation behind the scenes for things such as inventory, scheduling, finance, pricing, customer service, quality control, supply-chain management, robotics integration, etc. If that ERP/IT layer is outsourced to be delivered and supported by foreign providers or non-citizen contractors, the entire ‘Made in America’ claim has a hidden security leak.”
I said, “Definitely, because if China has access to your IT systems, they can steal your intellectual property from your CAD systems. They learn how you price your products, how you schedule production, what your wages are, et cetera. I can’t understand how American manufacturers can’t see that any foreign company that has access to all of your IT systems can get any data they want about you. Very few Chinese companies are privately owned companies. They’re either partially or fully-owned by the government or they have investors that are top-level government employees or CCP members.
David responded, “That’s right, and it’s so dangerous. Not only that, but the configuration of ERP systems takes specialization and knowledge of specific business functions. All of these programs take expertise. I could name 100 different ERP software programs besides the well-known NetSuite, Infor, Global Shop, and SAP. What we do is we listen to people. The software is made to be infinitely generic because it has to be able to support a very wide swath of companies. So, we have to come back and give them two or three options to configure the software to meet the needs of their company. If you have consultants from another country that don’t speak the English well, they aren’t going to be able to understand what you want and need. They may have a different thought process about quality. My thought process on quality is that it’s not done until it’s 100%, right, and I don’t care how long it takes.”
In closing, David said, “It seems like you have spent decades writing about how to save American manufacturing. I’m asking the ‘Made in the USA’ community to evolve their definition to include ‘Made in the USA’ by U.S. citizens when they select IT & ERP implementation resources for all the positive community and domestic self-sufficiency reasons you outlined.
We agreed that sourcing IT services with American companies will provide a company with the following tangible benefits:
- In person consulting vs. consulting via Zoom, phone, and email
- Personal interaction in configuring the ERP software to fit the needs of your company
- Reduced risk of key company data being stolen
- Compliance traceability
- Domestic accountability
We need to do whatever it takes to rebuild our manufacturing industry to ensure that we have the commercial and military/defense products needed to keep Americans healthy and safe. Reshoring of IT services is another way we can ensure that we have a secure domestic supply chain.
Tags: American manufacturing, reshoring