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Title: High Tariffs Become 'Real' For Adafruit - With Their First $36K Bill
Just For Import Duties

Link: https://yro.slashdot.org/story/25/05/10/07152...

Adafruit's managing director Phillip Torrone is also long-time Slashdot
reader ptorrone. He stopped by Thursday to share what happened after a large
portion of a recent import was subjected to a 125% +20% +25% import markup...
We're no stranger to tariff bills, although they have definitely ramped up
over the last two months. However, this is our first "big bill"... Unlike
other taxes like sales tax where we collect on behalf of the state and then
submit it back at the end of the month - or income taxes, where we only pay
if we are profitable - tariff taxes are paid before we sell any of the
products. And they're due within a week of receipt, which has a big impact on
cash flow. In this particular case, we're buying from a vendor, not a
factory, so we can't second-source the items. (And these particular products
we couldn't manufacture ourselves even if we wanted to, since the vendor has
well-deserved IP protections). And the products were booked &
manufactured many months ago, before the tariffs were in place. Since they
are electronics products/components, there's a chance we may be able to
request reclassification on some items to avoid the 125% "reciprocal" tariff,
but there's no assurance that it will succeed, and even if it does, it is
many, many months until we could see a refund. We'll have to increase the
prices on some of these products. But we're not sure if people will be
willing to pay the higher cost, so we may well be "stuck" with unsellable
inventory - that we have already paid a large fee on... Their blog post even
includes a photo of the DHL customs invoice with the five-digit duty fee...
Share your own stories and experiences in the comments. Any other Slashdot
readers being affected by the new U.S. tariffs?

Read more of this story at Slashdot.

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