In an era when most consumer electronics and smart home devices bear “Made in China” labels, the decision to manufacture domestically seems financially quixotic. Overseas production offers labor costs one-third to one-fifth of American wages, established supply chains for electronic components, and economies of scale that make competing on price nearly impossible for US-based manufacturing. Yet in 2025, following a $19 million Series A funding round, Irrigreen made the counterintuitive choice to establish manufacturing operations in Wisconsin—located just an hour from its Minnesota engineering headquarters—rather than following the well-worn path to Asian contract manufacturers.
The decision wasn’t driven by patriotic sentiment or political pressure, but by a calculated business strategy addressing specific challenges in precision irrigation manufacturing. CEO Shane Dyer and his team recognized that their digital sprinkler technology had unique requirements that made domestic production not just viable but advantageous despite higher labor costs. The question wasn’t whether American manufacturing could match overseas pricing—it was whether engineering optimization, supply chain resilience, and quality control benefits could offset the wage differential without forcing price increases that would slow adoption.
The Wisconsin facility, located approximately one hour from the company’s Minnesota headquarters, represents a bet that proximity between engineering and production teams creates value that transcends simple cost-per-unit calculations. For products requiring tight tolerances, rapid design iteration, and close coordination between software and hardware development, the timezone and communication advantages of domestic manufacturing can outweigh the labor cost premium. The challenge was proving this thesis while maintaining competitive pricing in a market where homeowners compare smart irrigation systems against both traditional sprinklers and competing digital alternatives.
Engineering Design That Makes Domestic Production Economics Work
The economic viability of US-based manufacturing hinges on component reduction and design simplification that minimize touch labor per unit. Traditional irrigation systems require numerous parts—12-20 sprinkler heads for typical residential properties, each containing springs, nozzles, seals, and mechanical linkages. The precision irrigation approach inverts this model: fewer heads (typically 2-4 per property) but more sophisticated technology per head. This component consolidation creates favorable manufacturing economics because labor costs concentrate on fewer, higher-value units rather than dispersing across many simple mechanical assemblies. The latest generation system, often called Irrigreen’s S3 sprinkler, exemplifies design-for-manufacturing principles. Earlier prototypes measured approximately 8 inches in length and required deeper burial, complicating installation and increasing housing complexity. The current 5-inch design reduces material costs, simplifies machining, and enables standard burial depths that installers already use for conventional systems. The horizontal inlet configuration—replacing earlier vertical inlet designs—further streamlines installation while simplifying internal plumbing within the head itself, reducing assembly steps and potential failure points.
Modular architecture amplifies these advantages. Rather than integrated assemblies requiring complete replacement when components fail, the system uses swappable modules that enable field repairs without specialized tools. This modularity serves dual purposes: it simplifies manufacturing by allowing separate production of sub-assemblies that final workers combine, and it reduces warranty costs by enabling targeted component replacement rather than whole-unit swaps. For a domestic manufacturer facing higher labor costs, this repair-friendly design partially offsets the price differential by reducing post-sale service expenses.
The auto-clean technology embedded in the valve system demonstrates how engineering can reduce recurring labor costs. Sediment and mineral buildup plague all irrigation systems, but precision valves controlling 16 independent streams are particularly vulnerable to clogging. The self-flushing mechanism maintains performance without manual cleaning, reducing field service calls that would otherwise erode margins. This reliability focus reflects domestic manufacturing economics: when service calls require dispatching US-based technicians rather than simply shipping replacement units from overseas warehouses, engineering for longevity and self-maintenance becomes financially crucial.
Material sourcing strategies balance domestic content with global supply chain realities. Certain components—particularly semiconductors, sensors, and specialized electronics—simply aren’t available from US suppliers at any price. The manufacturing strategy focuses on domestic production of mechanical components, final assembly, testing, and quality control while sourcing electronic subassemblies globally. This hybrid approach captures proximity benefits for critical manufacturing stages while acknowledging that complete supply chain domestication remains infeasible for electronic products.
Automation deployment follows similar pragmatic lines. High-volume, repetitive tasks like valve body machining and pressure testing use automated equipment that requires minimal labor regardless of location. Skilled assembly work, calibration, and quality verification—tasks difficult to automate and requiring judgment—employ domestic workers whose proximity enables rapid problem-solving when issues arise. This division between automated commodity operations and skilled human operations mirrors successful domestic manufacturing in other sectors like aerospace and medical devices.
The one-hour proximity between Minnesota engineering headquarters and the Wisconsin production facility creates iteration velocity impossible with overseas manufacturing. When field testing reveals a design improvement opportunity or installer feedback suggests a modification, engineering teams can literally drive to the factory, prototype changes, test results, and implement production updates within days rather than months. This rapid iteration cycle enables continuous improvement that compounds over time, steadily driving down production costs and improving product performance in ways that offset initial labor cost disadvantages.
Supply Chain Resilience and Quality Control Advantages
The pandemic exposed fragilities in global supply chains that had operated smoothly for decades. Container shipping disruptions, port congestion, and unpredictable lead times forced companies dependent on overseas manufacturing to maintain enormous inventory buffers, tying up working capital and increasing carrying costs. For Irrigreen’s domestic production, the calculus shifted: while component costs might be higher, inventory carrying costs decrease when lead times shrink from months to weeks.
This supply chain responsiveness proves particularly valuable during rapid growth phases. The company’s Pro Select Partner Program expanded to all 50 states and Puerto Rico, with contractor membership growing fivefold year-over-year. Meeting surging demand requires production flexibility that overseas manufacturing struggles to provide—minimum order quantities, long lead times, and container shipping schedules constrain responsiveness. Domestic production enables smaller batch runs, faster turnaround on reorders, and the ability to shift production volumes quickly based on real-time demand signals from the expanding installer network.
Quality control integration represents another domestic manufacturing advantage. Overseas production typically relies on third-party inspection firms conducting periodic audits, with defect discovery happening after products ship or, worse, after installation in customer yards. Wisconsin manufacturing enables engineering teams to identify quality issues immediately, implement corrections in hours rather than weeks, and maintain direct oversight of critical production parameters. For precision irrigation systems where valve timing and pressure control require tight tolerances, this quality control proximity translates directly to product performance and customer satisfaction.
The tariff environment added another variable to manufacturing location economics. Trade policies implemented in 2024-2025 increased import costs on various categories of goods including some electronic components and assembled products. While domestic manufacturing doesn’t eliminate tariff exposure on imported subassemblies, it minimizes the tariff burden compared to importing fully assembled units. This policy stability—avoiding potential future tariff increases on finished goods—provides long-term cost predictability that overseas manufacturing cannot guarantee given uncertain trade relationships.
Professional installer support benefits from manufacturing proximity as well. When contractors report field issues or request technical clarification, having production staff available in compatible timezones and without language barriers accelerates problem resolution. This responsiveness builds installer confidence and supports the rapid network expansion driving company growth. The Pro Select Program’s success—growing to encompass partners in all 50 states—depends partly on this support infrastructure that domestic manufacturing enables.
The broader industry implications extend beyond a single company’s manufacturing strategy. If precision irrigation can demonstrate that domestic production of smart home hardware remains competitive through engineering optimization and supply chain advantages, it establishes a template other categories might follow. The traditional offshoring playbook assumed that labor cost differentials always dominated other factors. But for products requiring rapid iteration, close engineering-production integration, and tight quality control, the total cost equation may favor domestic manufacturing more than conventional wisdom suggests.
Consumer benefit materializes through product reliability and support responsiveness rather than dramatic price reductions. The domestic manufacturing strategy maintains competitive pricing while delivering faster warranty service, more reliable supply during growth phases, and the quality consistency that precision valve systems require. For homeowners investing thousands in irrigation upgrades, these reliability and support factors often outweigh modest price differences, making the domestic manufacturing approach viable in competitive markets.
The Wisconsin manufacturing decision ultimately represents a calculated bet that engineering optimization, supply chain resilience, and quality control benefits can offset labor cost disadvantages for precision hardware products. Early indicators—sustained growth, professional installer adoption, and maintained competitive pricing—suggest the strategy is working. Whether it establishes a broader template for smart home manufacturing reshoring remains to be seen, but it demonstrates that domestic production can compete when companies engineer specifically for that manufacturing context rather than treating it as a simple cost comparison against overseas alternatives.
