AMBA Benchmarking

AMBA's advocacy partner provides regular updates on legislation and other public policies. Updated on Dec. 8, 2024.

The last update includes information specific to:

• U.S. Congress
• Regulatory Activity
• Trade, Tariffs, Supply Chains, and Industrial Base

This report benchmarks employee satisfaction and engagement in the U.S. moldmaking industry, highlights HR best practices and provides actionable insights that impact retention amongst domestic mold manufacturers.

Benchmarks and best practices in the following areas are featured: 

• Employee Satisfaction and Engagement in U.S. Mold Manufacturing 
• Cultural Elements 
• Employee Praise and Recognition Strategies
• Best Practices in Performance Feedback 
• Bonus Incentives and Merit-based Pay
• Professional Development Opportunities 

This is a members-only publication. Interested in this report, but want to review the contents first? Download a sample of the report below.

Download the Report Sample

In addition to its other grant and scholarship opportunities offered, the AMBA has gathered information on other state, regional and national grants available to U.S. businesses and manufacturers. These grants, tax incentives and other sources of financial support address a variety of areas, including: 

• Job readiness and training
• Workforce development
• Economic growth (local, regional and national)
• Competitiveness in international markets
• Apprenticeship programs
• STEM activities
• Public infrastructure
• Community development
• Workers re-entering the labor market (i.e., veterans, disabled individuals, etc.)

This is an evolving list that AMBA will continue to update.

This report includes charge rates specific to services supplied by U.S. mold manufacturers in engineering, moldmaking and specialty services, as well as high-level business insights and takeaways that will help executives make intelligent decisions related to their business.

Additionally, this report includes details regarding the following:

• Company demographics
• Mold size and type production
• Average overhead cost
• Gross margin ranges by annual sales revenue
• Current v. anticipated capacity utilization

Due to the sensitive nature of this report, its contents are available for purchase only to AMBA members in good standing with the association. If you are not a current AMBA member but are interested in joining the organization and accessing this report, please email info@amba.org.

Please note, only non-members who become members will be given an access code.

Interested in this report, but want to review the contents first? Download a sample of the report below.

Download the Report Sample

This report includes current benefit benchmarks from U.S. plastics processors, mold manufacturers and rubber products manufacturers.

While health, dental, vision, ancillary and retirement benefits were all reviewed this year, the report also reviewed the utilization of new strategies to control healthcare dollars and contain costs.

Interested in viewing a copy of this report, but want to see the contents first? Download a sample of the report below.

Download the Report Sample

AMBA's annual 2024 Business Forecast Report showcases data on sales trends, profit levels, capital expenditures, shop and design employment levels and challenges faced in the industry. Data from this year's report is pulled from surveyed responses on 33 economic indicator questions that covers 2023 performance, fourth-quarter performance and forecasts and expectations for 2024. 

Interested in this report, but want to see the contents first? Download a sample of the report below.

Download the Report Sample

This annual report is the leading compensation study in the U.S. mold building industry. Now in its thirteenth year, AMBA’s Wage and Salary Report contains comprehensive analyses on over 50 job classifications from mold manufacturers who serve a variety of end-use markets. This year’s report also benchmarks information related to cost-of-living increases, vacation benefits, employee incentives, salary adjustment opportunities, hiring expectations, employee demographics and more.

For the first time, five-year trends on individual wages are featured, along with select interviews from AMBA members.

Interested in viewing this report, but want to see the contents first? Download a sample of the report below.

Download the Report Sample

This report includes charge rates specific to services supplied by U.S. mold manufacturers in engineering, moldmaking and specialty services. This year, the report particularly focuses on high-level business insights and takeaways that will help executives make intelligent decisions related to their business.

Additionally, this report includes details regarding the following:

• Company demographics
• Mold size and type production
• Average overhead cost
• Gross margin ranges by annual sales revenue
• Current v. anticipated capacity utilization

Due to the sensitive nature of this report, its contents are available for purchase only to AMBA members in good standing with the association. If you are not a current AMBA member but are interested in joining the organization and accessing this report, please email info@amba.org.

Please note, only non-members who become members will be given an access code. 

The 2023 Operational Efficiencies Report represents a first-time collection of operational efficiency strategies and measures reported by U.S. mold manufacturing facilities. Responses were collected in both a traditional survey format prior to AMBA Conference 2023 and via a live benchmarking session facilitated by AMBA Executive Director Troy Nix and Laurie Harbour, owner of Harbour Results, Inc. (Southfield, MI) during the conference. 

Gathered results focused on member strategies and investments intended to enhance profitability, increase throughput, improve workforce utilization and effectively implement new technologies. Additionally, respondents described whether they had won business from China and other foreign competition and the key differentiators that allowed them to do so. 

Over 60 AMBA members contributed to this report, supplying over 200 unique responses that described the ways in which they have strived to improve efficiency in their mold building operations.

When purchased, this report will be available in a PDF format; to view the interactive version of this report, visit the report's Table of Contents.

Download the Report Sample

AMBA's annual 2023 Business Forecast Report showcases data on sales trends, profit levels, capital expenditures, shop and design employment levels and challenges faced in the industry. Data from this year's report is pulled from surveyed responses on 33 economic indicator questions that covers 2022 performance, fourth-quarter performance and forecasts and expectations for 2023. Advocacy- and workforce-related data also is included in this year's report.  

New this year: For the first time, AMBA has created an interactive version of this report that has been reorganized to better illustrate how this data can drive business operations. Please note that the link to view the interactive version of this report is on page three of the PDF received upon purchase.

The 2022 Wage and Salary Report includes high, low and average rates of pay across over 50 job functions commonly found in mold building. This data allows industry professionals to determine their competitiveness as an employer, measure employee ROI and better understand the latest industry practices and trends.

In this year's report, additional roles have been included, as well as questions relative to cost of living increases, incentives to attract qualified labor and sales bonus structures.

As was the case last year, health and benefits data has been removed from this survey and will be surveyed separately in early 2023. 

Please note: All AMBA members that completed this survey receive the report at no cost. Non-members that completed this report are able to purchase it for a discounted rate. Please contact Rachael Pfenninger for more information at rpfenninger@amba.org

To address one of the most critical challenges in workforce development facing the U.S. moldmaking industry, AMBA has published for the first time its Employee Attraction and Hiring Playbook – A Best Practices Guide. Developed in conjunction with its 2021 Workforce Development Task Force, this 65+ page playbook encompasses best practices and industry insights related to the attraction, hiring and retainment of high-quality, high-performing employees. 

Key report takeaways included the identification of unexplored recruitment avenues, opportunities to engage with local communities and/or manufacturing-related programs, the generation of white paper content and the implementation of a mentorship and/or cross-training program. Respondents also provided a review of key characteristics associated with both high- and low-performing employees and the implementation of cultural values and expectations. 

To complement the best practices shared by AMBA members within the playbook, several industry insights also are gathered to provide context and alternative perspectives and to encourage the pursuance of new opportunities related to hiring and retention. Insight areas include spotlights on varied recruitment opportunities, next-generation cultural motivations, new employee “pre-boarding” tactics and additional takeaways.

This publication is available only to AMBA members.

More than ever, manufacturing professionals are seeing the need for new investments in areas related to sales and marketing. One area of particular interest is the use of a customer relationship management (CRM) system. For this reason, AMBA has benchmarked the use of CRM systems across three manufacturing sectors - mold manufacturing, plastics processing and rubber products manufacturing.

The final report provides executives and sales and marketing professionals with evaluations of CRM system features and overall use in these industries. CRM use has been evaluated on features offered in the following areas:

• Prospecting and lead generation
• Customer relationship management and database use
• Analytics and automation
• Investment and ease of implementation

Compilation of policies, resources and best practices for working from home during COVID-19.

Understanding how to schedule jobs and maintain efficiency in any mold manufacturing facility can be critical to a business' ability to win orders and keep existing customers - both of which significantly impact the bottom line.

For this reason, AMBA surveyed its members to benchmark programming efficiency in their shops. Gathered data included workforce representation (including total employees vs. CNC programmers and setup operators), preferred programming software, shop floor programming vs. offline programming, the efficiency of certain programming methods for repeat and new jobs and recent investments in technologies and/or machines to improve efficiency. 

Because effective onboarding can play such a strong role in employee retention and overall workforce development, the AMBA recently sought to gather examples of New Employee Onboarding checklists, as well as demographic and HR policy data from U.S. mold builders.

This benchmarking opportunity sought to not only provide HR policy data, but to also give U.S. mold builders real-world examples of onboarding practices. At the end of this report, an addendum of over 20 new employee onboarding checklists and documents are included from surveyed mold manufacturers that provide real-world examples of onboarding at their facilities. These checklists provide both a benchmark for companies with an existing process, as well as a guide for those companies interested in developing one.

Deciding when to hire dedicated sales personnel, whether it's time to implement automation in the sales pipeline and how each action will affect the bottom line can be a challenge for mold builders of any size. Access the information needed to make tactical decisions regarding 2019 sales strategies with AMBA's newest report, Managing the Sales Pipeline.

Although every mold builder faces unique challenges, stalled workforce development continues to plague the U.S. mold manufacturing industry.

According to the National Association of Manufacturers, in Indiana alone, 87 percent of manufacturers indicate difficulty in recruiting young people. However, this is not due to a lack of available job opportunities. According to a recent Deloitte Insights report, over half of the potential two million jobs that will become available over the next decade in manufacturing will likely go unfilled due to a skills shortage.

To read more about how mold builders are mitigating the workforce developments facing the industry today, purchase the report below.