NAICS 332710 · California overview

Machine Shops & Precision Machining in Imperial County

Imperial County had 3 Machine Shops establishments in 2023, ranking 37 of 40 California counties and accounting for 0.1% of the statewide total.

Establishments (2023)
3
Rank 37 of 40 counties
Employees
6
Mid-March employment
Annual payroll
$437,000
All establishments
Per 10k residents
0.2
181,411 residents

More recent reading

BLS QCEW, 2026Q1

The figures above are County Business Patterns, which carries the size distribution but runs about two years behind. The Bureau of Labor Statistics publishes quarterly, so this is the same industry roughly 3 years later. The two count different universes, Census counts establishments with paid employees in the March pay period and BLS counts worksites covered by unemployment insurance during the quarter, so the numbers are not directly comparable and either can be the larger.

Establishments
3
2026Q1
Employment
n/a
Quarter-end level
Average weekly wage
n/a
Per covered worker
Quarterly trend
0.0%
2025Q2 to 2026Q1
Concentration vs the national averageBLS, 2026Q1

0.19 location quotient. Machine Shops employment in Imperial County is about 5.3 times less concentrated than in the United States as a whole.

Computed by the Bureau of Labor Statistics, not derived here. Above 1.0 means the industry is a larger share of local employment than of national employment.

Establishment trend

Year-over-year establishment counts, County Business Patterns. Net growth of 0.0% since 2020.

YearEstablishmentsChange
20203n/a
202130
202330

How this market compares

Imperial County against every other county in California on the same measure. The median excludes places under 2,000 residents, where per-capita figures are arithmetically true but analytically useless.

Thinly served0.2 per 10,000 residents, against a state median of 0.4

Well below the state median. Either a genuine gap in provision or a market served from somewhere nearby. Worth checking the neighbouring places below before drawing a conclusion.

Vs state median
-60%
Businesses per resident
Rank by count
#37
of 40 counties
Rank by density
#38
of 40 ranked
Since 2020
0%
Change in establishments

Density compares machine shops & precision machining provision per resident. It does not measure revenue, profitability or whether a market is worth entering.

Business size mix

Imperial is more consolidated than California as a whole: fewer micro-operators and a larger share of businesses with real headcount. Fewer targets, but the ones that exist are more likely to be financeable.

Share of establishmentsImperialCaliforniaDifference
Under 5 employeesOwner-operated, often no management layer0.0%47.0%-47.0%
5 to 49 employeesThe range most individual buyers target0.0%45.6%-45.6%
10 or more employeesPractical floor for acquisition financing0.0%27.7%-27.7%

What acquirers look at

Classic succession target: aging owner-machinists, real equipment collateral, and sticky aerospace or defense customer qualifications that take years to replicate.

Cities in Imperial

The figures above cover the county as a whole. These are the places within it.

Other industries in Imperial

Sources

  1. U.S. Census Bureau, 2023 County Business Patterns. Establishment counts, employment and annual payroll by NAICS. Retrieved 2026-09-08.
  2. U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, Quarterly Census of Employment and Wages (2026Q1). Quarterly establishment counts and employment for employers covered by unemployment insurance. Retrieved 2026-09-08.