Brands celebrate tariff reprieve, but fresh uncertainty looms

But the celebration was short-lived, clouded by the prospect of another round of tariffs. In a Truth Social post on Saturday, Trump said he would raise the global tariff rate to 15%, a day after he said he would impose an across-the-board tariff of 10% on U.S. trading partners under trade law Section 122. In his Truth Social post, he said the 15% duty would take effect immediately. 

“We’re back into the same vortex of uncertainty,” O’Leary said. “This is probably not the end of the story, but just the beginning of another chapter of uncertainty and challenges for small businesses.”

For some brand executives, the uncertainty is already affecting day-to-day decisions. Allen Walton, founder of the electronics brand SpyGuy, said he recently received a notice from DHL stating that tariffs were still due on a shipment from China, even after the Supreme Court ruling.

“Now I’m like, ‘Do I actually pay those?’ I don’t really understand,” he said. “I wish I had known that they were going to do this ruling, because I just paid another $6,000 earlier this week in tariffs.”

Others are delaying future orders altogether. Greg Shugar, who runs a neckwear business called Beau Ties of Vermont, said he has a purchase order ready for fabric from Italy but is considering whether to hold off for 150 days — the length of time Trump’s 15% global tariff can remain in effect under the statute he invoked, unless Congress votes to extend it.

“I have to look closely at what we’re looking at, or maybe I just take in a few critical pieces now and wait for the rest later,” Shugar said.

Trump’s trade war has weighed heavily on retailers and consumer brands. Many accelerated orders and built up inventory ahead of expected tariff deadlines, tying up cash to avoid steeper duties later. Others delayed shipments, hoping that the U.S. would negotiate more favorable trade terms. As it became clearer that the added costs may stick, companies trimmed headcount, renegotiated with their suppliers and raised prices. 

The Supreme Court’s 6-3 decision striking down the tariffs imposed under the International Emergency Economic Powers Act upended months of planning and disrupted what little predictability companies had carved out.

Trump had used IEEPA to impose sweeping tariffs last year, including the so-called “reciprocal” duties that climbed as high as 50% on countries such as India and Brazil and reached 145% on Chinese imports. But the ruling does not prevent the administration from pursuing tariffs through other trade authorities. Within hours of the decision, Trump signaled he would continue pushing new tariffs, including raising the global baseline rate. That leaves companies facing the possibility of a different slate of trade measures, even as courts sort out what happens to the old ones.

In other words, after restructuring supply chains and pricing to account for the duties, executives now find themselves reassessing the landscape yet again. 

“It’s tempered joy,” said Marianna Sachse, founder of sustainable children’s clothing brand Jackalo. “I’m grateful that the impact of these tariffs on me as a business owner will be reduced, but we still are not leaving this really, really challenging phase of uncertainty.”

Sorting out refunds

The status of billions of dollars collected in duties remains in limbo. Estimates of how much money could be refunded range from $133 billion, based on the latest U.S. Customs and Border Protection public data, to as high as $175 billion.

“The Court says nothing today about whether, and if so, how, the Government should go about returning the billions of dollars that it has collected from importers,” Justice Brett Kavanaugh wrote in his dissenting opinion. He added that the refund process was “likely to be a ‘mess,’ as was acknowledged” during the court’s oral arguments in November.

To guard against potential delays in the refund process, several retailers — including Costco, E.l.f. Beauty and J.Crew — have filed lawsuits seeking reimbursement for tariffs already paid. Smaller businesses, however, may not have the legal resources to take similar action. Jackalo’s Sachse said she plans to seek pro bono counsel to better understand her options, though she is not optimistic about the likelihood of recovering the funds.

“We’re not like a Costco, which can say, We’re going to sue to ensure that we’re going to get refunded for our tariff,'” she said. “For small businesses, that money is probably lost.”

Other brands are pessimistic about the prospect of refunds. Arin Schultz, chief growth officer at Naturepedic, an organic mattress and bedding manufacturer, said he doesn’t believe the company will recover all the money it lost on tariffs last year.

“Some money might get back out, but we’re just hoping that, to a certain degree, the government relents and sees what it’s doing overall to the economy and to everyday shoppers,” Schultz said. “We’re in the midterms this year, and you would think that this administration would do whatever they can to make themselves look a little bit rosier for consumers, and we’re just not there right now.”

Salt Lake City–based Kuru Footwear estimates the tariffs have cut roughly 6% from the company’s bottom line. But Kuru has opted not to pursue legal actions. “You can imagine it certainly puts a bull’s-eye on the back of a business if they take the stance of, ‘Hey, I’m going to try and sue the government,’” said Tyler Christensen, Kuru’s COO. 

Ryan Close, founder and CEO of Bartesian, which sells at-home cocktail machines, said he is skeptical about how any refund process would work, given that he worked with manufacturers and thinks he would have to fight with them to get the money. 

“Even if it ever does come to fruition, it’s going to likely be years,” he said.

A year of disruption 

Even if brands recoup what they paid, many say the damage has already been done.

At Kuru, roughly 70% of its shoes were once manufactured in China, but the company has since shifted production to Vietnam and other parts of Southeast Asia — a move that cost about $400,000. Any tariff refunds would likely cover only the duties brands have already paid, not the broader costs of shifting production or restructuring operations. Executives at Kuru say their goal is to have roughly 75% of goods produced outside China. Even with Trump’s “reciprocal” tariffs deemed illegal, Kuru plans to continue diversifying where it makes its products.

Willow’s O’Leary said tariffs have added millions of dollars in incremental costs over the past year. Willow manufactures its medical-grade devices in Southeast Asia, including Thailand and Singapore, where tariff rates in the high teens have significantly increased its import costs. To avoid raising prices, O’Leary said Willow reduced its employee headcount and cut back on research and development spending. 

Tariffs had a direct impact on Close’s business, Bartesian. Higher product costs due to tariffs led to a dispute with a distributor that forced Bartesian to take on its own distribution, he said, declining to share specifics because of potential legal issues. That led to products being removed from retailers in 2025 until Bartesian reinstated those relationships. Some, like Target, are still yet to relaunch.

“That hurts for a consumer brand,” Close said. “You want to be in a place [where] consumers can touch and feel the product, and see it.”

Close said the company also cut its marketing spend by about 60-70% from 2024 to 2025 to offset tariff costs. The company, which launched in late 2019 and now generates about $100 million in annual revenue, grew last year — but at a slower pace than in prior years.

At Naturepedic, the company had to raise prices around October because it was paying almost 20% more for the same products than it had a year before. He said they raised prices about 7% across the board.

“We actually held off on raising any prices for as long as we possibly could, because we had a lot of lower-priced, pre-tariff raw materials in stock that we wanted to work our way through. We generally buy around six months [of product] at a time,” Schultz said. “We did not want the consumers to eat all of that; we’d prefer they ate none of it.”

But Schultz said the company had to pass some of the increased costs on to customers to continue growing.

“Hopefully we don’t have to have any more price increases this year; I assume we’re not going to have to,” Schultz said. “If the tariffs do end up getting lessened, we probably will lower some prices back down. But that probably won’t happen until the end of summer because of our buying cycle. We’ve got a lot of expensive raw materials, either here or on the water, already on order.”

In addition to raising prices by about 10%, SpyGuy’s Walton said he reworked some of his products to lower production costs, trimming features such as battery life, storage capacity and audio quality.

Even now, with Trump’s tariffs struck down, brands say they’re still navigating uncertainty.

“I can’t do anything. I’m paralyzed. I’ve been paralyzed,” Shugar said. “The only thing I’d say that’s predictable is the fact that it will continue to be unpredictable. That’s the worst part.”