Estimated read time: 2-3 minutes
- Tariffs on Chinese imports impact Utah businesses like Mayday Games.
- Owner Seth Hiatt faces $5,000 extra costs per container due to tariffs.
SPANISH FORK — From inside a warehouse, employees at Mayday Games package tabletop games and collect card sleeves to send out to customers and stores. But the products themselves, like many others in the U.S., are made in China.
Owner Seth Hiatt now lives in China where he can help oversee the manufacturing.
"I knew there were tariffs coming, but I didn't know what they were," Hiatt said of the new charges. "Every time we get one of those containers, it's an extra $5,000 that I have to pay. I have to write the check from our company to the federal government to get the product out of port."
In short, toys and games are being hit with a 10% tariff. They were exempted from the last round of President Donald Trump's tariffs in 2018 and 2019. While that may sound like a small amount, Hiatt said the price increases are impacted at various levels before products reach the consumer.
"It's a five-fold increase over the whole supply chain because the distributor and the store and the consumer all got to take a piece," Hiatt explained. "That's what will happen is our price of a $50 game will go to $60, $65 in a few months."
Hiatt stockpiled his products ahead of the tariffs, which he said would buy him maybe a couple of months before he has to raise prices. In the end, he believes the tariffs do little to nothing to fix trade deficits.
"This isn't a political thing," Hiatt said. "Like, there's not a place in the world that doesn't have a trade deficit with somebody. And, that's just how it is. It's like, yeah, trade deficits inherently aren't bad. It means they have cheaper stuff than we can make it."
Hiatt said based on what he's seen from manufacturers in China, it would take around a 300% tariff before it would make more sense to manufacture back in the U.S. Long before then, he said business owners like himself will have moved on to other countries that can manufacture without a tariff.
