6 Tool Box Brands That Are Manufactured In America

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How hard could it be to find a tool box brand that makes its product in America? If you've been looking for one such tool box, or any tool made in the USA, you know that it's not as easy as it should be. And it's not just an issue of economics. Even if you're willing to spend a little more, the country of origin of a product can be obscured — by mistake, on a poorly made store page, or by design, with the use of phrases ("assembled in the USA") that imply what can't be stated openly. However, that can go the other way around as well. A lot of foreign car brands, for example, make their products in America.

It might not be easy, but we managed to find six brands that manufacture at least a few tool boxes in the USA. Most of the brands that make all their tool boxes in America make all their tools in the country, usually offering premium products for a premium price. Some decide to offer a small selection of clearly defined "Made In The USA" products that are more expensive than the otherwise similar imported goods offered by the same company. A few try to straddle the line between offering an affordable alternative to luxury, American-made tools and affordable imports. A minority of them, perhaps trying to make the choice for the consumers, are not too transparent with just how American their products are.

If you need a classic reddish orange box with plenty of space and a removable tray, the Proto J9971R is a good choice. The price, $63.55, is nothing to write home about, but it's not too bad, either. It comes with a removable tray for easier storage and better access to the many tools this thing can contain. It also has a handle for easier transport. If you asked a child to draw a tool box, they would draw a Proto J9971R. According to the manufacturer, the J9971R can transport as many as 931 pounds while being relatively lightweight, at just 8 pounds. These tool boxes are sold empty, making them a solid pick if you're compiling your own kit. If you're considering a loaded tool box, you'll have to look elsewhere.

This isn't the only one of those tools made by Proto. But be careful: Not every Proto product, not even every tool box, is made in the U.S. That's the case with the (much cheaper) general-purpose Proto J9954-NA tool box, a solid alternative to the J9971R that, according to its Amazon page, is made in China. That's a shame for those who were looking for a compact alternative to the (quite large) J9971R. How large? The made-in-the-USA Proto tool box is 19 inches long, measuring about 9 inches in width and 8 inches in height. That's enough to hold most long, thin tools, but way more than you need for some hammers, adjustable pliers, and screwdrivers.

Kennedy Manufacturing, recently renamed to just Kennedy, has been around for over a century. That gives a little more credibility to its bizarre claim of inventing the metal tool box, but only a little. What it did do, with great success, was elevate the prestige of those metal boxes, so much so that the company's smallest, cheapest metal container, the 20-inch All-Purpose Hand Carry Tool Box, retails for $237.50. This is a premium product, and it's made in the U.S., which bumps up the price significantly. It's quite large, too, at 20x7x7.5 inches. Still, it shouldn't go unsaid that the vast majority of Kennedy's competition wouldn't dream of pricing a tool box at over $200. Even if it cost half as much, it would still be one of the most expensive hand carry tool boxes on the market.

This brand has been around for a while, so you can probably find an old tool box to give a new life to on the used market. Kennedy makes a lot of storing solutions, with a focus on roller cabinets and machinists' tool boxes, and they're all really expensive. That said, all those cabinets are made in the U.S., a rarity which makes Kennedy one of the most dedicated tool box brands in this endeavor. The company even claims to be "producing and marketing" a variety of "classic and innovative tools" in Van Wert, Ohio, as it has been doing since 1914. Kennedy's metal storage solutions include chests big and small aimed at machinists and mechanics, the eye-wateringly expensive professional line Maintenance Pro and the slightly more affordable KSeries.

According to this brand, "over 99% of Wright branded products are manufactured in the USA." Those are some good odds, but what if you don't want to take any chances? Thankfully, the item descriptions on Wright's website tell us that the majority of those tool boxes are made in the United States. That's the case with the big, bright red 21-inch 3-Drawer Chest, a hand carry tool box that states its country of origin as United States. The only downside (besides the significant weight of 20 lb) is that, like most other products from this brand, it's quite hard to find. It's tough to even talk about the price/quality ratio because the price varies from distributor to distributor.

Most major online tool stores don't sell this brand of tool boxes. However, even if Amazon, Lowe's, and Home Depot won't sell you a Wright tool box, you can find a physical or online store that has what you need. You do need a little patience, though, as the brand's Find A Distributor web page isn't perfect. It doesn't even tell you which store has which product. Wright doesn't just make metal boxes, even though that's probably what you're here for. If you're looking for other storage solutions, you can find some chests, drawers, and rolling cabinets as well. As for tool boxes, Wright has a few short ones of different lengths, a classic hand carry tool box in standard and heavy duty variants, and a big three-drawer chest that is, at least according to the website, portable.

As you probably know, anyone can add the word "USA" to their company and continue to import all their products. That's not the case with Pioneer Steel USA, as all its products are "made in the USA" – not "assembled in," not "made in USA with global materials." If you've been scouring through self-proclaimed American tool boxes for some time, you know how refreshing this kind of language is. Pioneer Steel USA offers a lot of different metal storage units for tools, dozens by the look of it, including hand carry tool boxes of various sizes. A look at the brand's website will immediately tell you that, although it makes a point of manufacturing its products in the USA, those products are quite affordable.

They might not be outright cheap, but $35.25 for the Hand Held Standard Tool Box is a good price. Larger boxes, especially if they come with a tray, will naturally be more expensive, but they're still reasonably priced. For $110.75, you get a massive 30-inch wide tool box, the kind that's hard to call portable, and an included tray. Pioneer Steel USA makes some affordable cantilever-style tool boxes, which make small tools and accessories more accessible. If you're looking for something with a small footprint, take a look at the Red Steel Storage Case collection. Some of them come with a handle as well. If you need a tray with a lot of separate, small storage spaces, you can try the Mechanic's Boxes instead.

Plano doesn't make a million different tool boxes, but it seems to build most of its products in the USA. The Plano Portable Tool Box is one of those products, and with 2,600 user reviews, it seems to be quite popular. At $20.99, it's also quite cheap by the standards of American-made tool boxes. At 20.25 inches, it's a little on the long side, but through the power of being made of plastic, it only weighs four pounds. But even though it's relatively wide, don't expect it to carry all your stuff. The power of plastic cuts both ways, making the maximum weight recommendation 10 pounds. The same is true of most Plano tool boxes, like the popular (made in the USA) 13-Inch Compact Tool Box, since they're all plastic.

"That's good news," you might think. Finally, a proper affordable brand that makes its tool boxes in the USA. That would be great news, sure, but don't get too excited just yet. As we can see on the store page of Plano's Grab-N-Go portable tool box, this container is manufactured in China. Or is it? On closer inspection, one of the item's pictures shows a yellow background with the words "Made in the USA" printed under the American flag. So which one is it? It's hard to say. And it's not just Amazon. Other stores seem to share the confusion. According to Plano's website, the brand makes all its storage solutions in the USA, but the inventory on the site is missing a lot of products, including the Grab-N-Go. What about those? Are they also made in the USA? It might be impossible to tell.

Craftsman tool boxes are made in the USA, more or less. Before looking at that statement, though, we should point out that Craftsman's metal storage boxes are well-liked while being, all things considered, not too expensive. At $170.62, the 3-Drawer Steel Heavy-Duty Middle Tool Chest is quite reasonable. It's a big piece of metal (26 inches long) and made to be stacked and form a storage cabinet. The same goes for the plastic modular tool box giant, the 3-in-1 Rolling Tool Box. The problem we hinted at before has nothing to do with the quality of those boxes, and everything to do with the Made in the USA statement. Only some of those products are branded as such, and the words they use ... they're a little strange.

The full sentence that accompanies products like the tool chest we mentioned before is: "Proudly Made in the U.S.A. with Global Materials in Sedalia, Missouri." One could reasonably think that "global materials" means the product is made in American factories, from American parts, but with imported raw materials. Whether that counts as American-made is for you to decide, but even if it does, "global materials" can mean something else entirely. In at least some circumstances, the words have been used to mean "imported parts, affixed together in the USA." Now, we're not saying that's the case with Craftsman. First, because there's no way to know for sure. And second, because that could constitute what the FTC has called "de minimus finishing," meaning that the tool isn't "American enough" to warrant that name.