THE AMERICAN BRICK INDUSTRY

Over two hundred thousand workers depend on the American brick industry for their employment. Fifteen thousand are directly involved in producing brick. Another 15,000 work in sales and distribution throughout the country. Yet another 150,000 are employed as bricklayers and laborers for the mason contracting firms that install the product. And thousands more work for the suppliers to the industry, the manufacturers of brick-making equipment and ancillary products sold by brick distributors.

While sixty years ago there were several thousand brick manufacturers with nearly 3,000 brick plants; today there are 83 manufacturers in the United States, operating 204 plants, with the capacity to produce 91/2 billion brick annually. Plants are located in all but eleven states (AK, DE, HI, ID, MT, NH, NV, RI, SD, WI and WY), and produce a wide variety of structural clay products including facing brick, paving brick and glazed brick and tile, in a multitude of sizes and shapes. Ninety-six percent of the product line is face brick.
 

In 2002, the most recent year for which complete data exists, 8.1 billion brick were sold. Sales since 1997 have been above or close to 8 billion brick, making them six of the ten best years since 1972.

Two thousand and two's 8.1 billion brick sold generated $1.7 billion at the manufacturer level, with freight charges not included. Installed, factoring in the added costs of distribution and labor, that brick generated approximately $9 billion in total revenues.

The 2002 Brick Sales and Marketing Report shows that 81.0 percent of brick sold in that year were used in residential construction, 16.0 percent in commercial/industrial/institutional construction and 2.9 percent for non-building uses, such as landscaping. Fifty-nine point six percent of brick sales were through dealers and distributors and 40.4 percent were direct sales by manufacturers.

In the commercial market, brick is still a leading wall cladding material. On the residential side, 20 percent of the new homes constructed in 2001 were more than 50 percent brick, according to the Census Bureau's Characteristics of New Housing report. 2001 Regional Products and Consumption by Census Region were as follows:
 

The reduced number of manufacturers and plants is the result of several causes, including industry consolidation, as the larger, publicly held companies acquired many smaller, family-owned companies. There have also been dramatic improvements in the production processes, as well as in distribution, sales and transportation.

A modern tunnel kiln today can produce from 40 to 80 million brick a year in a continuous process, in contrast to the older, periodic kilns which produced perhaps 2 million brick through batch processing. The newer manufacturing processes require a substantial capital investment that may be beyond the means of many companies.

Brick manufacturers today compete in much larger geographic markets than in the past. While railroads used to be the dominant mode of transporting brick, today more flexible truck transportation is the rule.

Brick manufacturing companies represent a mix of a few large corporations and many small family-owned or closely held businesses. The trend continues toward consolidation and concentration. The top ten manufacturers represent over 82 percent of current production capacity. Foreign investment in the U.S. brick industry has increased in the last decade. About 54 percent of current capacity are owned by concerns from Australia, Austria, England, Germany, Ireland and Turkey.