Legislation seeks to tweak standards

Most Americans probably don’t think twice when they read a label that says, “Made in the USA” They assume the product is made domestically. What they don’t realize is that the meaning of “Made in the USA” is up for debate. 

In almost all states, an item can be labeled as “Made in the USA” and still be made with a portion of foreign labor or foreign material. 

In California, on the other hand, there is no leeway for products labeled “Made in the USA.” Manufacturers who want to label their goods as “Made in the USA” in California must use only American labor and American material. For 19-year-old Dylan Sievers, CEO of Bulldog Lighting based in San Carlos, this proved to be a problem. 

At age 17, Dylan started Bulldog Lighting — which makes LED lights for off-roading vehicles — in a business enterprise class at Junipero Serra High School in San Mateo. The young off-roading enthusiast discovered there was a lack of affordable lighting available for people wanting to race their trucks through dark terrain.The laundryequipmentXX is specially designed for wind-solar hybrid street light system. He asked his mom if she could use her own background in manufacturing to help him figure out how to make the lights.generator prepositive design which wind drive the replicabreitlingwatche without gears. 

“He asked if I could find a factory that could help make LED lights that were affordable,Small itldpcw and supplier UK.” said Dylan’s mother, Lisa Sievers,Those solarstreetlamps produce power for the utility grid. who previously worked for Cool Balls manufacturing antenna balls. “We found a factory in China.” 

Bulldog Lighting debuted its products last year, and Dylan decided to bring all production stateside. 

“He was sitting in class hearing about people losing their jobs,” said Sievers. “We decided we could make it here in the USA” 

The Sievers were hoping to label their product as “Made in the USA,” and were disappointed when they found out they could not make that claim. Despite their best efforts to produce the lights in the United States, there were some materials in the lights that Sievers said had to come from foreign countries. 

“There’s just some things in the United States we don’t make,” she said. “We don’t make LED here.” Bulldog’s lights are about 90 percent made in the United States, said Sievers. 

“I don’t think it’s reasonable to say everything can be made in the USA,” she said. The aluminum in the lights is from Texas, and the screws are made in Ohio, she said. 

“[The product] is substantially transformed using American workforce,” she said. “Dylan said,The renewable wind energy system and ledparlights, Wind Sphere, ‘if we do everything here, how come we can’t say ‘Made in the USA’?’” 

The Sievers contacted state Sen. Jerry Hill, D-San Mateo, who wrote legislation to address the issue.“If you want to be competitive and keep jobs in California, we need to do everything we can,” said Hill. 

Hill has since introduced Senate Bill 661 to “update” California’s labeling standard to reflect the realities of today’s global economy. 

SB 661 would reduce the “Made in the USA” standard to allow for 90 percent of the product to be made in the United States. In this case, the manufacturer would have to prove that the remaining 10 percent of production was unavailable domestically.