INDIANAPOLIS — Small business owners are breathing a small sigh of relief after learning there is a 90-day pause on President Trump's 145% tariff on Chinese goods.
One local business tells WRTV that while the temporary pause is great, there's not a whole lot they can do in 90 days.
“Yeah, I can show you in here kind of where it all starts," said Steve Hall, co-founder of Tinker Coffee Co.
What started as an idea between Hall and his brother-in-law made way for Tinker Coffee Co.
"November of 2014, we officially opened for business and started selling coffee in Indianapolis. And at that point, we were just a whole roastery, just selling coffee to other coffee shops and restaurants and churches and offices, and that just gradually grew over time. And now we have a diversified group of coffee businesses, including our own cafes," Hall said.
Hall said over the years, his business has seen its fair share of obstacles, but none like tariffs.
"For like the raw products for a lot of our other elements of our business, including our packaging cups, lids, all of that, we've had to make some adjustments to where we source those items," he said.
Hall said most of their coffee is imported from Nicaragua, Honduras, Rwanda and Ethiopia. When it comes to cups, lids and packaging coming from Canada and China, that's where it gets tricky.
"Our 5-pound bags are made in China, so we're trying to figure out how we kind of best navigate that challenge now with the pause on tariffs. Maybe we're able to hurry up and get an order into the country in 90 days. Maybe we can do that, maybe we can't," Hall said.
The 90-day pause on Trump's reciprocal tariffs is set to expire in July, and his recent pause on the 145% tariff on Chinese goods is set to expire in August.
"50,000 bags at a time, that adds up. If the cost is increasing, almost double or more than double, that can really have a huge impact on us and force us to increase prices across the board," Hall said.
Hall said with so much uncertainty surrounding businesses right now, patience and understanding are what's getting him through.
"Everybody's kind of dealing with this thing, and for smaller businesses, they don't have the scale to purchase gigantic quantities of things. We're just going to do our best to handle the tariffs and price increase as best we can, and hopefully, we can all get through it together," Hall said.
The Yale Budget Lab estimates current tariffs will increase prices by 1.7% in the short run, costing the average household about $2,800 a year.
Economists said consumers will likely start to see more of the impacts soon
