Manufacturers as a group had a pretty good year in 2022. But online and with ecommerce, they had an even better one.

All in, U.S. manufacturers generated total sales of $6.560 trillion in 2022, an increase of 11.5% from sales of $5.884 trillion in 2021, based on data from the U.S. Department of Commerce and a projection by Digital Commerce 360.

This growth in total sales came despite battling headwinds such as supply chain disruption, a labor shortage, higher inflation and slowing economic conditions.

Manufacturing sales grew because businesses kept buying goods and services of all kinds. As an example, total orders for manufacturing technology of all types in 2022 totaled $5.54 billion, a 6% decrease from total orders in 2021, says The Association for Manufacturing Technology.

But the biggest growth for manufacturers is a direct result of B2B ecommerce. Last year, the sales that manufacturers generated across ecommerce sites and apps grew to $623.3 billion. That’s up about 15% from $543.3 billion, based on a projection by Digital Commerce 360 for the forthcoming 2023 US Manufacturing and Distribution Report.