Lodge Cast Iron

Lodge has poured iron in South Pittsburg, Tennessee since 1896 and still operates two foundries there. The seasoned cast iron and seasoned carbon steel that the brand is known for — the skillets, griddles, dutch ovens and grill pans — are made in that town, and the 2021 expansion put $56m and 239 jobs behind that fact rather than behind a slogan.

It is a split line, and the enamel is where it splits. USA Enamel is poured in the same South Pittsburg foundry as the seasoned cast iron and finished a few yards away in an enameling plant Lodge built specifically so that colourful enamel could be made domestically at all. Essential Enamel is imported — Lodge’s own words — and a third range, Luxe Enamel, has been added since this record was written and says “Made in China” on its listing. So the brand’s mark here is the floor, and the Tennessee cookware is carried below with its own marks. “Lodge” and “made in Tennessee” are not the same sentence at the shelf, and the line name is what tells them apart.

Something changed under this record while it was being re-checked, and it is worth stating. The blog post this catalogue relied on for the split has been rewritten. The sentence that named the two lines — “our history-making collection of USA Enamel™ made on US soil; and our much-loved, imported Essential Enamel” — is no longer on it, and neither is the FAQ answer that placed USA Enamel in the South Pittsburg foundries. What survives is the word “imported” attached to Essential Enamel, which is enough, and the new Luxe listing, which names China outright.

The domestic enamel line also looks to be winding down. Two USA Enamel items are left in the whole shop, the 4.5 qt Dutch oven at $164.95 reduced from $249.95 with a colour sold out, and the grill pan; the collection page that used to list them returns a 404. The seasoned cast iron and carbon steel — the skillets, griddles, dutch ovens and grill pans the brand is known for — are unaffected and still come out of those two foundries.

One caveat that has not changed: even USA Enamel is not literally all-domestic. Lodge’s own product page says “Proudly made in the USA with imported hardware,” which is why that record sits one mark below the bare cast iron rather than beside it.