Yes, and it's a Great Story
Sharpie is made in the USA. This is one of the more significant American manufacturing comebacks of the past decade.
Almost every Sharpie marker is now made in Maryville, Tennessee, at a factory that runs around the clock, seven days a week, producing 1.8 million fine-tip markers per day. That’s more than 500 million Sharpies a year, from a single Tennessee facility.
It wasn’t always this way. In the early 2000s, Newell Brands — Sharpie’s parent company — moved parts of production offshore. By 2018, significant Sharpie manufacturing was happening in China. What happened next is worth knowing.
The $2 Billion Reshoring Story
In 2018, Newell Brands — headquartered in Atlanta, Georgia — made a decision to bring Sharpie manufacturing back to the United States. The strategy wasn’t driven by patriotism alone. The company invested nearly $2 billion in automation, robotics, and worker training at the Maryville facility, overhauling production lines that had operated largely the same way for decades.
The result: production speed increased three to four times. Quality improved. Average wages at the Maryville facility — which employs approximately 550 workers — rose roughly 50% over five years, without layoffs. And the cost of manufacturing domestically, after automation, became competitive with Chinese production.
Newell’s CEO told the Wall Street Journal: “There’s no longer a reason to manufacture Sharpie outside the U.S.”
The retractable Sharpie line, which had remained in China longer due to technical complexity, was brought back to Maryville after engineers solved the quality challenges involved. The Clearview highlighter line was in the process of moving back from China as of late 2025.
What's Made in Tennessee
Five of the six components in a standard Sharpie are now sourced and manufactured domestically. The one exception is the felt tip, which is imported from Japan.
The Maryville factory handles injection molding, assembly, filling, and printing on site. The facility contains 50 injection molding machines, 32 packaging lines, and over 100 assembly and printing lines.
The fine-tip permanent marker — the classic Sharpie in all 93 colors — is made in Tennessee. The retractable line is now domestic. The Clearview highlighter is in the process of returning from China.
A Note on Other Newell Brands Products
Sharpie is owned by Newell Brands, which also owns Paper Mate, Sharpie, Elmer’s, Rubbermaid, Coleman, and several other consumer brands. The reshoring initiative is specific to Sharpie — other Newell Brands products have their own manufacturing footprints and are not covered by this post.
For the standard permanent marker specifically, Sharpie’s return to Tennessee manufacturing makes it one of the straightforward positive recommendations on this site — American-made, widely available, and priced at roughly $1 per marker.
*If you are interested in fountain pens, please visit our page at Fountain Pens Not Made in China (2026)*
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Last verified March 2026.
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