What E&E Manufacturing makes

E&E Manufacturing is a heavy-gauge metal stamper and structural-assembly builder for wheeled vehicles. The company runs progressive die and transfer die stampings, deep drawn structural extrusions, roll forming, welding, and complete welded assemblies, with a press fleet that spans roughly 150 to 2,500 tons. Its signature product is the stamped metal fastener: E&E patented the conical moated weld nut in 1978, and that part became an industry standard now listed in the GM standard fastener catalog.

The heavier work sits alongside the fasteners. E&E has big-bed transfer and progressive presses aimed at body-in-white stamping and automated assembly cells, plus chassis components including full frame assemblies, cross members, and axle components. It stamps stainless exhaust parts such as muffler baffles, shells, end plates, and brackets, and it handles the harder materials that trip up many stampers: high-strength and ultra-high strength steel, dual-phase materials, alloy steel, aluminum, and carbon steel up to 8mm thick. Because E&E is vertically integrated with its own tool shop, it designs and builds much of its own tooling and quality equipment in-house, and it markets a specific engineering move to buyers: replacing secondary fasteners with integrated extrusions to remove handling steps, cut tooling cost, and eliminate a failure point.

The customer base runs across automotive, military, commercial, and industrial markets. E&E has built stampings and assemblies for foreign, domestic, and luxury automakers and their tier suppliers, full frame rails and axle brackets for heavy and medium trucks, and high-strength steel and aluminum armor components for U.S. Army armored tactical vehicles.

Ownership and history

E&E is a fourth-generation, family-owned business, and it has been independent since it started. The company was founded in 1962 in a 5,000 square foot building on what is now its Plymouth, Michigan campus, producing automotive stampings with presses up to 300 tons. It became a GM Tier One supplier after patenting the weld nut in 1978, opened a technical center for research and prototyping in 1990, and expanded into Athens, Tennessee in 2004 and 2005 to follow customer demand. It commissioned the first of two servo presses in 2011 and has since pushed into high-strength steel, aluminum, and complex assemblies.

Leadership stays inside the family. According to a 2018 U.S. Small Business Administration Office of Advocacy site visit, the company is run by president Wallace (Wes) Smith, grandson of the founder, alongside his daughter Jeanne Swanson as Chief Cultural Officer and sons-in-law Brian Swanson as Chief Financial Officer and Matthew Menchinger as Chief Growth Officer. E&E describes its own culture in plain terms, a hands-on, flexible operation that it sums up as "We Care," and it points to multiple generations of workers on the floor as evidence. The company today operates two US plants, Plymouth and Athens, with a combined footprint the company puts at more than 600,000 square feet.

Certifications and quality

E&E holds IATF 16949:2016 certification at both the Plymouth and Athens plants, the automotive quality-management standard, and it lists ISO 14001 environmental certification at both sites. Its on-site metallurgical lab is accredited to ISO/IEC 17025:2017 through A2LA, certificate number 3077.01, valid through November 30, 2026, a scope the company first achieved in the mid-2000s. That lab runs optical and electron fractography, micro-hardness and tensile testing, weld measurement, macroetching, and failure analysis, and it issues complete engineering reports. On the shop floor, E&E uses CMMs, white-light and blue-light scanners, Perceptron, Keyence, and Faro measurement systems, and it designs and builds much of its in-process sensing and error-proofing itself. The company markets industry-leading PPM quality and consistent on-time delivery as core selling points.

Known customers

E&E's customer relationships are documented in its own history and in federal coverage rather than left to inference:

Fisher Dynamics was also named alongside these in the 2018 article. The customer list reflects a supplier positioned close to Detroit and Tennessee OEM plants for delivery and communication.

Sourcing evidence

E&E's US import record reads like an assembler pulling in components and tooling rather than a reseller moving finished goods. ImportYeti shows 183 sea shipments between April 2015 and May 2025, dominated by European and Turkish automotive seating and interior suppliers. The most active foreign suppliers are Adient Turkey Seating (47 shipments), Sodecia Safety & Interiors in Germany (44), Johnson Controls in Turkey (28), and the fastener maker Hewi G Winker in Germany (18), with additional Sodecia and Almac lanes behind them.

Six shown of the suppliers on record. By origin, the flow is 66 percent European and 32 percent Asian: Belgium leads with 52 shipments, then Turkey (39), Germany (33), Portugal (16), China (15), Spain (9), and South Korea (5). Declared tooling codes appear in the mix, including HTS 8207.30 for stamping, pressing, and punching tools, consistent with a manufacturer importing dies and fixtures for domestic production. ImportYeti estimates cumulative ocean shipping spend at roughly $316,000 across the period, with cost data covering about 73 percent of shipments, an order-of-magnitude figure rather than an audited one. Buyers weighing nearshoring and tariff exposure will note that most of E&E's inbound lanes are transatlantic seating and interior components, and that the most recent recorded sea shipment landed in May 2025.

Coverage caveats: these are US ocean-freight records only. Air, truck, and rail movements do not appear, some records name freight forwarders rather than manufacturers, and product categories come from declared manifest codes, which are noisy. Absence of a record is not evidence of absence.

Frequently asked questions

What does E&E Manufacturing make?

E&E Manufacturing makes heavy-gauge metal stampings, stamped metal fasteners, deep drawn structural extrusions, roll-formed parts, and welded assemblies for wheeled vehicles. Its presses run from about 150 to 2,500 tons. It is best known for the conical moated weld nut, which it patented in 1978 and which is listed in the GM standard fastener catalog, and it also produces body-in-white stampings, chassis frame assemblies, and stainless exhaust components.

Who owns E&E Manufacturing?

E&E Manufacturing is an independent, fourth-generation family-owned business founded in 1962. It is run by president Wallace (Wes) Smith, grandson of the founder, with several family members in executive roles, according to a 2018 U.S. Small Business Administration Office of Advocacy article. It is not owned by a parent group or private equity firm.

Who are E&E Manufacturing's customers?

A 2018 SBA Office of Advocacy article named BMW, GM, Mercedes-Benz, Volkswagen, Lear Corporation, Fisher Dynamics, and Oshkosh Defense among E&E's customers. E&E is a documented GM Tier One supplier whose patented weld nut sits in the GM fastener catalog, and it produces armor components for U.S. Army armored tactical vehicles.

Where is E&E Manufacturing located?

E&E Manufacturing is headquartered at 300/400 Industrial Drive in Plymouth, Michigan, 48170, with a second plant at 2000 Tellico Avenue in Athens, Tennessee. The two plants together cover more than 600,000 square feet, and both are positioned close to automotive OEM plants for delivery.

What certifications does E&E Manufacturing hold?

E&E Manufacturing holds IATF 16949:2016 certification at both its Plymouth and Athens plants, along with ISO 14001 environmental certification. Its on-site metallurgical lab is accredited to ISO/IEC 17025:2017 by A2LA, valid through November 2026.

How big is E&E Manufacturing?

E&E Manufacturing employs roughly 200 to 500 people across two plants and runs more than 600,000 square feet of manufacturing space. The company is privately held and does not publish audited revenue; third-party estimates place it in a $100 to $250 million band, which should be treated as an estimate rather than a reported figure.

Last verified September 27, 2026. Is this your company? Request a correction.