About Industrial Patterns

---

Industrial Patterns™ publishes reference editions for US manufacturing and distribution peer sets, organized into three modules. Operating Benchmarks (Module 1) is the annual reference on operating performance — margin behavior, labor elasticity, capital efficiency, and overhead (or scale penalty, depending on the industry) — across each peer set. Industry Structure Reference (Module 2) is the census-anchored reference on the structural condition of the same industries. Add-On Density Atlas (Module 3) is the annual atlas of where in the United States the establishment universe sits in each peer-set NAICS code. The editions are designed for private-equity diligence teams and the operators of mid-market US industrial firms. The material is descriptive — it does not provide advice, forecasts, or recommendations.

Industrial decision-makers are surrounded by information but often lack context. Company financials, market reports, and forecasts are easy to find; what remains hard to answer is whether a result is normal, structural, or unique. Industrial Patterns exists to provide a stable point of reference — not by predicting the future, but by describing the structure, behavior, and patterns that already exist.

Industrial Patterns is a reference publisher. It is not a consulting firm, a software platform, a research subscription, or a media company. The editions are built from durable federal data using transparent, auditable methodologies. They do not provide recommendations; interpretation remains with the reader.

The work is governed by five commitments: 

• intellectual honesty — no claim that cannot be supported; 
• restraint — no complexity that does not improve understanding; 
• durability — comparability over novelty, decades over quarters; 
• transparency — methods, assumptions, and limitations open to inspection; 
• independence — the framework changes only when it no longer describes reality adequately.

Industrial Patterns will never sell consulting disguised as research, manufacture urgency, or change methodology casually.

Editions are static, dated artifacts. Each edition applies a consistent analytical framework to observed data and is released without promotional cadence. Current editions and free samples are listed on the editions page.

The editor is Dave Carr. Dave is a DBA candidate, defending his dissertation on November 27, 2026. The dissertation examines target selection in private-equity buy-and-build investing in mid-tier US industries. He is the former president of Plasti-Fab Ltd., a building-materials manufacturer acquired by Carlisle Companies Incorporated (NYSE: CSL).

Professional history: LinkedIn · davidjcarr.ca.

Industrial Patterns uses publicly available, authoritative data sources. Operating Benchmarks draws on the U.S. Internal Revenue Service (Statistics of Income), the Bureau of Economic Analysis, the Bureau of Labor Statistics (Quarterly Census of Employment and Wages; Producer Price Index), and the U.S. Census Bureau (Economic Census; Annual Business Survey), with current-conditions data from additional federal monthly series including the Federal Reserve’s G.17 Industrial Production release, the Census Bureau’s Building Permits Survey, and the Bureau of Labor Statistics’ Job Openings and Labor Turnover Survey. For industries with an industry-native current-conditions indicator (such as the Air-Conditioning, Heating, and Refrigeration Institute statistical release for HVAC equipment shipments), the indicator is included in the current-conditions appendix with its source and vintage disclosed.

Industry Structure Reference draws on the U.S. Census Economic Census, County Business Patterns, Statistics of US Businesses, and the Census Bureau’s Business Dynamics Statistics. Add-On Density Atlas draws on the U.S. Census Bureau County Business Patterns at county geography. Population counts reconcile across modules — the three modules describe the same peer set from complementary angles.

Methodology is documented in each edition’s appendix in sufficient detail for an independent reader to audit any computed value. The full methodology for all three modules — shared framework, source architectures, edition cadences, and limits of inference — is described on the methodology page. Limits of inference and warranty disclosure are stated in the disclaimers.