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Where Are Orca Coolers Made

Need a reliable cooler for your next camping trip or tailgate? We did the research to find all of the coolers made in the USA. Check out more information about each of these American cooler manufacturing brands below.

Complete List of Cooler Brands Made in the USA

Mike’s YouTube Video on American Made Coolers

What About YETI?

Contrary to popular belief, YETI coolers are not 100% made in the USA. Their popular Tundra series is made at facilities in Minnesota, Wisconsin, and the Philippines. They also outsource manufacturing to China for some of their other popular products. Check out our recent article on YETI for more information. We also have similar research on where Coleman coolers are made.

How to Find Coolers Made in the USA

The best way to transport food while traveling is to load it all up in a cooler. The cooler market has rapidly expanded in recent years making the process of finding the perfect cooler more difficult than it may seem.

There is a lot of research involved in finding a good quality cooler that is also “made in the USA”. This guide breaks down how to buy a cooler that is “made in the USA” by material and gives a general overview of how to understand the labeling requirements for these products.

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What Does “Made in the USA” Mean?

The Federal Trade Commission (FTC) has guidelines in place to ensure that companies are not using false claims that their products are “made in the USA”. The claim that a product is “all or virtually all” produced in the USA means that the majority of manufacturing costs as well as the assembly must come from the United States. However, these guidelines can be quite confusing to understand, and too easy for companies to finagle.

For more information on this topic, you can click here to view our complete Made in the USA labeling guide.

Materials

There are several different materials that go into the making of a cooler. By looking at each of these materials separately, we can develop an understanding of where most of the production is done, giving us an idea of how hard it is to find products with these materials “made in the USA”.

Plastic

Most coolers use roto-molded plastics for the structure and base of the cooler. For the best durability, the plastic should be thick and well-made.

Around 20% of the world’s plastic is produced in the United States. This ranks the USA behind Europe and China. China produces the most plastic in the world, at 32%. When searching for a cooler, make sure to double-check where the plastic in the cooler was sourced to ensure it is truly an American-made product.

Pressure Injected Polyurethane Foam

Polyurethane foam is an insulator used to keep coolers cold. A thick, complete layer of polyurethane foam is the best way to retain ice and keep the cooler cold. Some brands will cut corners when it comes to this foam and not use it all the way around the inside of the cooler. Doing so will cause the cooler to not retain ice or stay as cold for as long.

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The United States is behind China and many other countries in terms of the production of polyurethane foam. However, the USA produces better quality foam due to quality standards that are not in place in China. There are harmful chemicals and carcinogens in Chinese-made foams. It is very important to check to make sure companies source their polyurethane foam from the USA.

Rubber

In many coolers, rubber is used in the lock mechanism as well as a tight seal around the opening of the cooler. When used as a seal around the cooler, the rubber acts as another layer of protection to keep the cooler cold. When put to the durability test, latches made of rubber last the longest.

Thailand is the number one producer of rubber in the world. Not a lot of rubber is produced in the United States, so this material is definitely one that will take research to ensure it is made in the USA.

Labeling

Title 19 Chapter 4 Section 1304 of the United States Code states that the FTC’s job is to protect consumers from false “made in the USA” claims that are made by companies about their products.

The FTC does not keep a close watch on companies but will take action when a false claim is brought to their attention. This means that it falls on the customers to watch out for false “made in the USA” claims and to call companies out.

In terms of labeling, words matter. Make sure to watch out for verbiage that may be used in product labels. An example of this is “made” versus “assembled” in the USA. When the verb “assembled” is used, it signifies that the product was not made in the USA but rather shipped over and merely assembled here. The label “made in America” is also something to watch out for, as it could mean that the product was made in either the USA, Canada, or Mexico.

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An American flag sticker is often seen as a simple way to identify when a product was made in the United States. However, this flag can often mislead consumers. The sticker is not government-regulated, which leads companies to use it as a way to deceive customers.

There are a lot of tactics that companies use to initially mislead customers into believing that their products are made in the United States. It is important to thoroughly check the manufacturer’s website and look for things like pictures of the production site or other clues that suggest where the materials were produced.

When companies are not upfront about where their product was produced, it is likely that it is not made in the USA. If it is actually made in the USA, the company would likely use this fact as a selling point rather than hide it. It is important to keep in mind that the FTC does not require companies to state the country of origin on their websites or promotional images.

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