Trace Adkins: American Made

Trace Adkins has long supported the American soldiers.  He’s performed in Iraq and at military bases around the world.  Now he wants to take that a step further.  Trace made a pledge last year: Buy American.  He told Country Countdown USA’s Lon Helton that it wasn’t easy: “Last year, I tried to make sure that every piece of merchandise I sell on the road was made in America.  I didn’t want to sell another item that said ‘Made in China,’ and I was ashamed of myself that it took this many years to do this.  Finally it dawmed on me that I didn’t have to sell stuff made in Taiwan, China, or India, and I’m willing to pay more for the merchandise.  It took a lot longer to find those vendors.  The hardest was ball caps.  It’s really hard to find an American company that makes ball caps.  I had an Army hat I got at West Point, and I figured it had to be American made, so I looked inside, and it said ‘Taiwan.’  I was shocked by that.  But I finally found a place where I could get caps.  So somewhere around halfway through that tour I had everything American Made.  So I went to Toby Keith and I told him about it.  Now Toby’s done the same thing.  I don’t know about anybody else, but Toby & I are making sure that all the merchandise we sell has ‘Made In America’ in it, and that’s why Toby can come out with this song.”

LISTEN to Trace HERE: 11-36 Trace4

WEB Extra: Toby Keith addressed this in an interview he did with CMT this week.  Here’s what Toby said: “Me and Trace Adkins made a pact last year, even to the point of me opening a factory that’s been closed down — to reopen it to make American-made stuff. However, when you try to retail that stuff, stores can’t put it in there because of what it costs to make in America. They can’t make any money off of it.”

Trace told Lon that there’s a guy who has a Made In America store.  He goes the extra mile to be sure even the threads are all made here.  Sometimes, companies will get the materials elsewhere and make them here.  But Trace says you need to go the extra step to be sure all the materials are made here.

Tags: trace

Category: Audio