Glass & Glass Product Manufacturers NAICS 3272

May 30, 2025 - Rising Costs

• A new report on the nation’s top glass fabricators finds the industry facing challenging times, with only 32% of companies surveyed reporting higher sales in 2024, compared to 70% in 2023. The 2025 Top Glass Fabricators Report published in Glass Magazine in March notes companies have faced higher raw materials costs since last August when major float – a common material used in glass making – manufacturers raised prices. The producer price index for flat glass manufacturing (including float) rose 3.3% last year, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics. Moreover, wholesale power prices are forecast to rise across most US regional markets this year, according to the Energy Information Administration. As an energy-intensive industry, glass and glass product manufacturing is sensitive to rising electricity prices. Weak demand and rising costs has spurred ongoing M&A activity in the industry and higher-than-average closures among glass fabricators, per the report.
• Installing bird-friendly film on the glass facade of Chicago’s McCormick Place has greatly reduced bird deaths from collisions, Glass Magazine reports. Pressure to act increased after about 1,000 migrating birds died in one night after colliding with the low-lying glass building. Following the deaths, McCormick Place installed bird-safe film produced by Canada-based Feather Friendly and retrofitted by National Glazing Solutions on the building’s windows in 2024. The film breaks up reflective or transparent hazards without affecting solar load or interior aesthetics. Deaths from collisions fell more than 95% last summer following the addition of the film, retired field museum bird division collections manager Dave Willard told the Chicago Tribune. According to the Tribune, when bird collision monitors conducted daily inspections last fall, they found just 18 dead birds. Willard says the deaths compared with 1,280 in fall 2023 and 771 in fall 2022.

• Manufacturers of glass and glass products are facing an acute labor shortage, which only looks to get worse, Glass Magazine reported recently. “Labor is the number one challenge for fabricators, glaziers, and full-service glass companies," says Jenni Chase, VP of Workforce Development for the National Glass Association, adding, "It is the biggest pain point for the glass industry,” Moreover, the construction and manufacturing industries are also facing a chronic labor shortage. Construction will need half a million workers on top of the normal hiring rate to keep up with labor demand in 2024 and again in 2025, per the Associated Builders and Contractors. A study by Deloitte and the National Association of Manufacturing reports that the ongoing shortage of skilled labor could lead to 2.1 million unfilled jobs by 2030. Recognizing the severity of the labor shortage, the NGA has added Workforce Development to its organizational goals.
• Employment by glass and glass products companies was flat in March compared to a year ago, while the average industry wage at nonmetallic mineral product manufacturers rose 6.5% in April to a new high of $28.29 per hour, according to the latest US Bureau of Labor Statistics data. The producer price index (PPI) for glass and glass product manufacturers, which measures prices producers receive for their products, rose 2.5% year over year in April, after posting a 0.5% increase in the previous annual comparison, according to BLS data. Industry sales rose 10.8% in Q4 compared to a year ago. Looking ahead, sales for the US glass and glass product manufacturers industry are forecast to grow at a 3.03% compounded annual rate from 2025 to 2029, slower than the growth of the overall economy, according to the Interindustry Economic Research Fund.