NAICS 33242Industry · 5-digitregional market

Metal tank (heavy gauge) manufacturing

SoftwareJob Shop & Metal Fabrication ERP 332

This industry comprises establishments primarily engaged in cutting, forming and joining heavy gauge steel to manufacture tanks. Establishments primarily engaged in fabricating and erecting large storage tanks, which must be assembled at the site, are included. — Statistics Canada, NAICS 2022A

Establishments · CanadaA: 131
Under 10 employeesA: 31%
Establishments · USA: 708
Employment · USA: 34,002
Payroll · USA: $2.3B

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

1–42519%

5–91612%

10–192620%

20–493527%

50–992015%

100–19997%

200–4990—

500+0—

Of 131 Canadian establishments with employees, 31% have fewer than ten — weighted toward mid-sized establishments.

Where they areA

Ontario4837%

Alberta3023%

Quebec2721%

Saskatchewan86%

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 332, 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.

regional competitionmedium capitalUNVERIFIEDinherited from 332 Fabricated metal product manufacturing

The classic machine and fabrication shop: reachable by acquisition from a retiring owner, limited by machine hours and skilled labour, and exposed to a few large customers.

Who sets the price: The customer's drawing and a competitive quote.
The software it runs on: Job-shop ERP, quoting, scheduling, CAD/CAM.

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 3324 Boiler, tank and shipping container manufacturing covers it.

Operating businessScreenedfiled at 3324

Certified Tank & Pressure Vessel ShopOne thing must be true

binding constraint: growth quality

The reachable proposition here is not a can line — that is a continuous-process plant selling to a handful of beverage fillers — but a code-stamped tank and pressure-vessel shop: propane and fuel tanks, heat exchangers, process vessels, welded to a registered design for regional energy, agricultural and industrial buyers. It is a real small-business population (303 Canadian establishments, a third of them under ten people) and the welding-code registration that looks like a barrier can be bought with an existing shop. The cut is what the one listed Canadian owner of such shops reports. TerraVest Industries grew sales 50% to $1,371.2M in fiscal 2025 — and its base portfolio grew 1% ($725.6M against $717.4M) [A]. Every other point of growth was purchased: four tank and vessel makers acquired in the year. That is the shape of the industry stated by its best operator: demand for tanks is flat replacement demand, and returns come from buying shops, consolidating steel purchasing and spreading certified designs across plants. An independent entrant owns one shop in a flat market, buys plate at a worse price than the consolidator, and meets that consolidator again as the natural bidder when it wants to sell. The 19% adjusted EBITDA margin TerraVest earns is a portfolio result, not a single-shop one. Software sold to these shops is screened separately.

NAICS 33244 vendors named12 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.

Sold across the wider branch

Vertical softwareScreenedfiled at 332 Fabricated metal product manufacturing

Job Shop & Metal Fabrication ERPExecution decides

binding constraint: distribution

Incumbent ECI Software Solutions (JobBOSS²) and Epicor

There are tens of thousands of machine and fabrication shops and no channel that reaches them — they are not on LinkedIn, they buy at trade shows and from their machine-tool distributor, and the ACV does not fund a field sales force. ECI and Epicor got there through decades of distributor relationships rather than through product. Nothing is disclosed here. Every vendor named on this record is private, or sits inside a parent that does not break the line out, so no revenue floor can be built and the market size is genuinely unknown rather than estimated.

NAICS 3324 vendors namedOpen →

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

1 row sits directly beneath 33242. Each has a base report of its own.

Code	Industry	Establishments · CA	What is known
332420	Metal tank (heavy gauge) manufacturing	131	screened at 3324

Alongside it, under 3324 Boiler, tank and shipping container manufacturing

Code	Industry	Establishments · CA	What is known
33241	Power boiler and heat exchanger manufacturing	49	screened at 3324
33243	Metal can, box and other metal container (light gauge) manufacturing	123	screened at 3324