Hand-sculpted glassware made in Appleton, Wisconsin since 2015
✅ Made in USA
Where BenShot products are made
Appleton, Wisconsin
BenShot’s glass workshop is at 415 N Perkins Street in Appleton. The business began on the grounds of a repurposed rural Wisconsin furniture factory once owned by Thomas Edison, and the glasses are still sculpted by hand rather than mass-produced.
Kiln-worked, one at a time
Glass is heated past 1,000°F, sculpted around the embedded object and then annealed — roughly seven hours of work per piece. The cheese glass listing puts it plainly: “handmade one at a time by our artisan glassmakers right here in Wisconsin — no mass production.”
American bullets, American packaging
The copper bullets are CNC-machined from solid, lead-free copper by Lehigh Defense in Clarksville, Texas — a named domestic supplier. BenShot states that all packaging and raw materials are made in the USA, and that the gift boxes are too.
BenShot’s origin claim is specific and traceable: product pages for both the bullet glasses and the non-bullet lines state that the glasses are handcrafted in its Wisconsin workshop and that “all packaging and raw materials are made in the USA.” The company also publishes a sourcing page, where it defines its own terms: “When we say ‘Made in USA’ we mean we source everything we can from U.S. manufacturers.” That phrase — everything we can — is an honest hedge, and worth noting. One genuine gap: the separate BenShot Gear collection of apparel, hats, playing cards and coasters carries no origin statement on its collection page, so do not extend the glassware claim to those items without checking the individual listing. Separately, and for the avoidance of doubt, BenShot itself states that the “Bulletproof” glass is a name, not a rating — the glass is not actually bulletproof.
The story
BenShot started in 2015 as a father-and-son project. The company’s Our Story page keeps the origin modest: “The ‘Bulletproof’ shot glass started as a father and son project in 2015 and developed into a family business.” The idea was simple enough to explain in one sentence and hard enough to execute that almost nobody else does it — embed a real bullet in the wall of a hand-blown glass so it looks like the round struck the glass and stopped.
Getting it right is a heat problem. The glass has to be hot enough to sculpt around a solid metal object and then cooled slowly enough that the difference in how glass and copper contract does not crack the piece. BenShot’s answer is a long kiln cycle and hand work: over 1,000°F, sculpted individually, then annealed, at roughly seven hours per glass.
The bullet was the first idea, not the only one. The catalogue now runs from the original 2 oz shot glass up through rocks glasses, wine glasses, pints, beer mugs and decanters, and the embedded object has expanded well past ammunition — a wedge of Wisconsin cheese, a guitar pick, a D20, a 10 mm socket, a saw blade, a fire axe, an anchor, a musket ball. The company holds at least seventeen US design patents on the designs, listed by number on its own site.
BenShot has also built a giving programme into the business, with veteran glassmaking events, a Stars for Veterans initiative, and donations the company now describes as reaching more than 800 non-profit organisations across the country.
Why they matter
Novelty drinkware is an import category almost by definition. The economics reward whoever can get a container of screen-printed glasses across an ocean cheapest, and the resulting product is designed for the freight cost rather than the hand.
BenShot is doing something that does not scale that way. A hand-sculpted glass with an embedded solid object cannot be run off a line in Asia at volume; it takes a glassmaker, a kiln cycle and hours per unit. The company has chosen to keep that work in Wisconsin and to source the components — including the copper bullets from a named Texas machine shop — from American suppliers.
It also matters that BenShot is small and specific about what it does. The sourcing page defines its own Made in USA standard instead of leaning on the phrase, and it does not pretend the apparel line is the same as the glassware. That kind of precision is rarer than it should be, and it is exactly what makes a domestic claim worth trusting.
Featured products
Browse BenShot bullet glasses, rocks glasses, pints, mugs and themed drinkware available now in the Buy American Campaign store.
Frequently asked questions
Where is BenShot glassware made?
In BenShot’s own glass workshop in Appleton, Wisconsin. Product pages state the glasses are “handcrafted in our glass workshop in Wisconsin,” made one at a time by the company’s glassmakers rather than mass-produced.
Are the bullets in BenShot glasses real?
Yes. Each bullet is CNC-machined from a solid piece of lead-free copper by Lehigh Defense in Clarksville, Texas, then sculpted into the wall of the glass while it is hot. BenShot also states clearly that the glass itself is not actually bulletproof.
How long does a BenShot glass take to make?
About seven hours per glass. The piece is heated to over 1,000°F, hand-sculpted around the embedded object, then annealed on a slow cooling cycle. Production is typically two to three business days.
What else does BenShot embed besides bullets?
Quite a lot: a wedge of Wisconsin cheese, a guitar pick, a D20 die, a 10 mm socket, a saw blade, a fire axe, an anchor, a hammer, a propeller, a musket ball and a combat knife, among others. The company holds at least seventeen US design patents covering these designs.