Natasha Khan
Appearances
WSJ What’s News
The Businesses Adding an Extra Charge With Trump’s Name On It
Well, we're seeing this tariff surcharge come up in a variety of companies selling things to consumer, you know, from bathroom fixture makers to toy shops, especially companies that make a lot of their products in China, they're really starting to tack tariff surcharges onto invoices as a separate line item.
WSJ What’s News
The Businesses Adding an Extra Charge With Trump’s Name On It
They want to be as transparent as they can with their customers about why there's suddenly a price differential between a product they might have been buying for some time or how they plan to attribute that tariff charge. One example we'll have is Jolie, which sells high-end filtered showerheads.
WSJ What’s News
The Businesses Adding an Extra Charge With Trump’s Name On It
Jolie's chief executive, Ryan Babenzine, told us that they haven't raised prices yet, but they are considering a price hike later in the year, depending on the situation. And he told us that the uncertainty is making consumers pull back on discretionary spending.
WSJ What’s News
The Businesses Adding an Extra Charge With Trump’s Name On It
Babazine told us that in anticipation of these tariffs, the company had been stocking up on inventory as much as they can before this latest announcement. Alexandra Fine is the chief executive of Dame, which is a sexual health company which markets vibrators made in southern China. Her company has already added what it calls a Trump tariff surcharge.
WSJ What’s News
The Businesses Adding an Extra Charge With Trump’s Name On It
Fine was telling us that the flat fee actually doesn't cover the full cost of what The tariffs have added to her cost of doing business, but that she felt that it was better than pretending that everything was normal.
WSJ What’s News
The Businesses Adding an Extra Charge With Trump’s Name On It
Everyday consumers don't understand how the tariffs are going to impact them. And they don't necessarily understand how and why businesses manufacture in the places they do and what it could look like elsewhere. And we thought this would be a good opportunity to educate consumers. and kind of just let people know that this is the policy that is impacting our price.
WSJ What’s News
The Businesses Adding an Extra Charge With Trump’s Name On It
In previous years, perhaps companies might have absorbed that cost or just sort of raised the price of the products. And so that's really something that is a little bit different about the situation is that they're specifically calling it out.
WSJ What’s News
The Businesses Adding an Extra Charge With Trump’s Name On It
Yes, definitely. One of the companies that we mentioned in our story, which is a toy store in Wisconsin, laid out all of these extra charges to their customers in an email soon after the latest tariff rate was announced and expressing sentiment of really regret that there has to be an increase in prices, but also promising that
WSJ What’s News
The Businesses Adding an Extra Charge With Trump’s Name On It
as the tariff rates adjust or perhaps get removed in the future, that they would accordingly also adjust that tariff surcharge. This is slightly different from a strategy of raising prices across the board. If they use this strategy of having a tariff surcharge, the price could be more dynamic as the situation changes.