NAICS 33122Industry · 5-digitinternational market

Rolling and drawing of purchased steel

This industry comprises establishments primarily engaged in drawing wire or rolling sheets, strips and bars from purchased iron or steel. — Statistics Canada, NAICS 2022A

Establishments · CanadaA: 63
Under 10 employeesA: 44%
Establishments · USA: 449
Employment · USA: 27,905
Payroll · USA: $2.0B

Size and shape

How many businesses there are and how small they are. Fragmentation is the first thing an entrant — or anyone selling software into this industry — needs to know, and it is one of the few things that is actually measured.

Canadian establishments by number of employeesA

1–41321%

5–91524%

10–191625%

20–49813%

50–9923%

100–19958%

200–49946%

500+0—

Of 63 Canadian establishments with employees, 44% have fewer than ten — an industry where large establishments carry real weight.

Where they areA

Ontario3352%

Quebec914%

British Columbia813%

Alberta711%

Largest four provinces by establishment count. Establishments with employees only — sole operators with no payroll are not in this table, so in trades and personal services the true number of businesses is higher.

How many new establishments are still tradingA

Manufacturing, US · opened 2020

86.2%

1 year

70.8%

3 years

58.4%

5 years

45.3%

10 years

opened 2015

Measured, not forecast: the share of US establishments opening in one year that were still active later. It counts good operators and bad ones together, which is exactly why it is the honest answer to “what are the odds”. It is for the whole sector rather than this market, and the ten-year figure comes from an older cohort because no younger one has reached ten years.

How businesses here compete

The structural profile of subsector 331, which every industry beneath it inherits. This is analyst judgment from how the subsector is organised — not research into this industry, and not a measurement.

international competitionhigh capitalUNVERIFIEDinherited from 331 Primary metal manufacturing

Not an entry market. Foundries are the reachable fringe and are closing faster than they open.

Who sets the price: Global metal markets and trade policy.
The software it runs on: Process and plant-control systems.

Market screens and studies

Market-entry records filed along this branch of the hierarchy. A record at or beneath this code is about this industry; one above it is about something wider that contains it.

Screened one level up. Nothing is filed at this exact code; the screen for 3312 Steel product manufacturing from purchased steel covers it.

Operating businessScreenedfiled at 3312

Steel Wire & Tube Conversion PlantOne thing must be true

binding constraint: defensibility

The pre-screen cut this on capital — "rolling and finishing plant". That is half right. A wire-drawing line or a tube mill is real money, but it is an order of magnitude below a steel mill, and the size bands show it: 112 of the 180 Canadian establishments, 62%, have fewer than twenty employees. People do own small plants in this group. The better question is what such a plant earns, and one Canadian company answers it in public. Tree Island Steel of Richmond, B.C. has drawn wire from purchased rod since 1964 — galvanized wire, nails, reinforcing mesh, fencing. In 2025 it reported revenue of C$161.8M, down from C$207.0M, and gross profit of C$9.5M — a gross margin under 6% — with adjusted EBITDA of C$3.0M and a net loss of C$5.3M, after a C$4.1M loss in 2024 [A]. It cut 27% of its workforce, withdrew from unprofitable product lines, suspended its dividend, and attributes the decline to expanded US tariffs on wire products [A]. That is the mechanism. A converter buys its steel from mills and sells a product defined by a standard, so its margin is the spread between two prices it does not set: rod or coil on one side, and on the other a finished-wire or tube price anchored by imports and by mills that convert their own steel downstream. Sixty years of operating history, brands and two countries of plant did not protect that spread. An entrant would have the same suppliers, the same standards and none of the history. Pipe and tube for energy markets follows drilling cycles and was not separately examined.

NAICS 33125 vendors named10 sourced figuresOpen →

Software serving this industry

The vertical software markets filed along the same branch — who sells to these businesses and who they would have to displace — and then the generic categories every business buys whatever it does.

No vertical software market has been recorded along this branch. What the subsector typically runs on: Process and plant-control systems.

Catalogued categories — named, not analysed

Discrete manufacturing ERP SaaS 31-33

And what every business buys · 25 generic categories

Sold to every industry rather than this one, so they are filed against the software industry's own code. The same few vendors recur across most of them.

Who works here

The occupations employed in Manufacturing, most concentrated in it first. The share is measured against the whole sector, not this industry — the published cross-tabulation stops there.

Concentrated in this sectorA

Aircraft assemblers and aircraft assembly inspectors One industry 91.3%

Supervisors, assembly and fabrication One industry 88.3%

Machine operators and related workers in pulp and paper production and wood processing and manufacturing One industry 86.1%

Managers in manufacturing and utilities One industry 84.4%

Machine operators and related workers in chemical, plastic and rubber processing One industry 82.7%

Mechanical, electrical and electronics assemblers and inspectors One industry 82.3%

Machine operators and related workers in food, beverage and associated products processing One industry 79.1%

Machine operators and related workers in mineral and metal products processing and manufacturing One industry 77.7%

Furniture, wood, plastic and other products assemblers, finishers and inspectors One industry 73.9%

Machine operators and related workers in textile, fabric, fur and leather products processing and manufacturing One industry 70.8%

These jobs are mostly done here. An operator in this industry is competing for them against others in the same industry, not against the whole economy.

And the jobs every business has

Other technical trades Across the economy 20%

Technical occupations in electronics and electrical engineering Across the economy 16.3%

Shoe repairers, shoemakers and upholsterers Across the economy 15.2%

Administrative and financial supervisors Across the economy 11.6%

Technical inspectors and regulatory officers Across the economy 10.7%

Administrative services managers Across the economy 9.6%

Legislative and senior managers Across the economy 9.2%

Building maintenance installers, servicers and repairers Across the economy 8.3%

Financial, insurance and related administrative support workers Across the economy 7.7%

Technical occupations in computer and information systems Across the economy 4.8%

Found across at least fourteen of the twenty sectors. In a small establishment several of these are usually one person, or an outside provider.

All 162 occupations →

Inside this industry

2 rows sit directly beneath 33122. Each has a base report of its own.

Code	Industry	Establishments · CA	What is known
331221	Cold-rolled steel shape manufacturing	48	screened at 3312
331222	Steel wire drawing	15	screened at 3312

Alongside it, under 3312 Steel product manufacturing from purchased steel

Code	Industry	Establishments · CA	What is known
33121	Iron and steel pipes and tubes manufacturing from purchased steel	117	screened at 3312