NEW YORK (AP) 鈥� President Donald Trump's continued roll out of a wide array of tariffs is rattling small business owners already dealing with tight profit margins.
Trump on Monday announced a and promised more import duties to come. Last week, the administration imposed a coming into the U.S.
Sandra Payne, owner of Denver Concrete Vibrator, imports steel and other raw materials for her business. Her company makes tools to settle concrete and other industrial tools. Most of the steel the company uses comes from China, and she gets material from Canada and Mexico, too.
鈥淪mall businesses run on very small margins. And so a 25% increase in any product is going to hurt," she said. 鈥淎nd we can鈥檛 just raise our prices every time the cost goes up to us. So we are losing a lot of money.鈥�
In addition to the steel and China tariffs, other tariffs on Mexican and Canadian goods have been d, but they could be implemented later. So, small business owners still need a strategy for mitigating the costs of the tariffs if they go into effect.
Across the border, Julie Bednarski-Malik runs a snack company, Healthy Crunch, based in Mississauga, Ontario. She sells her products in both Canadian and U.S. retail stores, and said she might have to raise prices depending on how the tariffs unfold. But she鈥檚 still in wait-and-see mode as tariffs loom.
鈥淚 know that this is going to come into effect, but we鈥檙e still unclear exactly the timing and the percentage and what sort of commodities are going to be impacted,鈥� she said. 鈥淲e hope that, you know, the U.S. and Canada could work together to find some sort of resolution because we are such close allies and trading partners.鈥�
Bar Zakheim, owns Better Place Design & Build, a contracting business in San Diego that specializes in building accessible dwelling units, or ADUs. He said he is especially worried about lumber.
鈥淭his stuff has already been getting more expensive over the past few years due to supply chain shocks and wildfires, and a huge proportion of our lumber comes from Canada,鈥� he said. 鈥淭hese tariffs are going to make everything we do considerably more expensive, at a time when the high-priced housing market and high interest rates are already cutting into our bottom line.鈥�
Payne, of Denver Concrete Vibrator, added that the tariffs will likely have a domino effect.
鈥滻 sell to other businesses, I don鈥檛 sell to the end user. So everything that happens to me is going to happen all the way down the line. It鈥檚 going to impact everyone down the line."
Mae Anderson, The Associated Press
