How Surrey's metal shops show up online
61%
We read the websites of 69 metal shops in Surrey, part of our study of 2,095 shops in 23 Canadian cities. Here is what they show buyers, and how Surrey compares.
What buyers in Surrey see
Surrey builds railings: 38% of its shops make railings and stairs, almost twice the share across all cities. Few do machining (23%, the lowest share of the 23 cities), and just one shop shows ISO without CWB. Equipment is the big gap: 61% of Surrey shop sites name none of it, one of the three highest shares. Among its structural steel shops, 12 of 16 name no equipment.
The basics
Four basics, and how Surrey compares
- 78%show no ISO or CWB certificationAll 23 cities: 74% · 4 points higher · tied 6th highest of 23 cities
- 61%name none of their equipmentAll 23 cities: 54% · 7 points higher · tied 3rd highest of 23 cities
- 97%don't say how many people work thereAll 23 cities: 96% · 1 point higher · tied 5th highest of 23 cities
- 42%don't say when they startedAll 23 cities: 49% · 7 points lower · 7th lowest of 23 cities
Only 2 of 69 Surrey shops say how many people work there.
The shop map
Every one of Surrey's 69 shops, one dot each
Pick what the colours show.
Shows a certification: 15Shows none: 54
Names its equipment: 27Names none: 42
Gives its team size: 2Doesn't say: 67
Each dot is a listed shop with a website, moved a little (about 250 m) so no single shop can be picked out. The darker outline is Surrey. The others are its neighbouring municipalities.
What a buyer checks
A shop's spec sheet, the way most Surrey sites read it
A made-up Surrey shop. A line is struck through when most of the city's 69 sites leave it out.
Sample Fabricating, Surrey
Sample shop, not a real company
- Services
Fabrication, welding, laser cuttingOn nearly every site - Phone
555 010 0142Shown on 68 of 69 - Certification
CWB W47.1 · ISO 9001Missing on 54 of 69 - Equipment
4 kW fiber laser · 220 t press brake · 5 axis millMissing on 42 of 69 - Year started
Since 1989Shown on 40 of 69 - Team size
34 peopleMissing on 67 of 69 - Small jobs
One-offs welcomeMissing on 42 of 69
The oldest Surrey shop that gives a year started in 1906.
How it compares
Where Surrey sits among the 23 cities
Each dot is one of the 23 cities. The dark line is all 23 cities together. Each row runs from the lowest city to the highest.
Show no ISO or CWB certification
60%85%
Name none of their equipment
34%73%
Don't say how many people work there
89%100%
Don't say when they started
33%60%
Don't say whether they take small jobs
31%77%
Close to home
Surrey and its neighbours
Langley 10 km · Burnaby 20 km · Delta 20 km
| Measure | Surrey69 shops | Langley39 shops | Burnaby28 shops | Delta32 shops |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| No certification | 78% | 72% | 82% | 78% |
| No equipment | 61% | 46% | 61% | 34% |
| No team size | 97% | 95% | 96% | 97% |
| No year founded | 42% | 44% | 36% | 34% |
How long they have been at it
40 Surrey shops say when they started
- Middle year
- 1994
- tied 4th youngest of 23 cities
- Started in 2001 or earlier
- 73%
- 10th lowest of 23 cities
- Oldest year given
- 1906
The other 29 give no year. Plum: started in 2001 or earlier. Teal: since 2002.
What people search for
What people in Surrey search for, and what shops show
- 140searches a month for “welding shop near me”from Surrey60%of welding shops in Surrey don't mention CWB
- 260searches a month for “cnc machining”from Surrey25%of machine shops in Surrey name none of their machines
- 140searches a month for “metal fabrication”from Surrey61%of shop websites in Surrey name none of their equipment
Source: Google Keyword Planner, average monthly searches from October 2025 to September 2026, read on October 28, 2026 for Metal Shop Guide. “From Surrey” means people searching there. “Across Canada” means searches that name the city.
What they show and what they do
Certifications and trades in Surrey
Certifications on their websites
| Group | Surrey | All 23 cities | Rank of 23 |
|---|---|---|---|
| None of these | 78% | 74% | tied 6th |
| ISO only | 1% | 12% | Lowest |
| CWB only | 16% | 12% | tied 5th |
| Both ISO and CWB | 4% | 3% | tied 5th |
ISO here means ISO 9001, AS9100 or ISO 13485. CWB means CWB W47.1 or W47.2. Rank 1 is the city with the biggest share.
The work they offer
| Work | Surrey | All 23 cities | Rank of 23 |
|---|---|---|---|
| Metal fabrication | 80% | 69% | 3rd |
| Welding | 44% | 49% | 17th |
| Sheet metal, cutting and bending | 38% | 40% | 14th |
| Railings and stairs | 38% | 20% | 2nd |
| Machining | 23% | 40% | Lowest |
| Structural steel | 23% | 20% | tied 6th |
Shares of all the city's shops. A shop can do several kinds of work. Rank 1 is the city with the biggest share.
If the site doesn't name the machines, an engineer can't tell if the part will fit
Industry in Surrey
A few numbers on industry in Surrey
- 1,100+manufacturing companies in SurreySource: Invest Surrey, advanced manufacturing
- 24,000+full time manufacturing workers in SurreySource: Invest Surrey, advanced manufacturing
- $39/hrmedian machinist pay, Lower Mainland regionSource: Job Bank, Government of Canada
From the city's page on Metal Shop Guide, each with its source.
For shop owners
In Surrey, add these three things first
In the order of the city's own gaps: what most sites here leave out first.
- 0197%of sites here don't show it
How many you are
Roughly how many people work there.
- 0278%of sites here don't show it
Your certifications, by name and standard
CWB W47.1 Division 2, ISO 9001:2015, AS9100D. Link the certificate.
- 0361%of sites here don't show it
Your equipment, with sizes
Make, model and the numbers that matter: bed size, tonnage, travel, axes, the thickest plate you cut.
Source
Where these numbers come from
For Surrey, Metal Shop Guide covers Surrey, Cloverdale and White Rock and lists 69 shops. All of them have a website of their own, and we read them, as of October 28, 2026. “Not shown” means we didn't find it on the pages we read. A blind check of 40 shops suggests each share is a few points high.
One shop is 1% of the Surrey total, so small gaps can be chance.
Cite this page: Figured Media, “How Surrey's metal shops show up online”, October 2026, with data from Metal Shop Guide. https://figuredmedia.com/research/metal-shops-online-2026/surrey/
Photo credits
- Surrey, at the top: Photo by Northwest, CC BY 4.0, edited (cropped)
- Shop floor, behind the quote: Photo by aluminum Zheng ji, Unsplash License, edited (cropped)
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Shop map: Statistics Canada, 2021 Census boundary files, Open Government Licence, Canada. Country map: Natural Earth, public domain.