Shein, Temu and the grinch who stole Christmas
San José, CA – Look out – while the storybook villain who stole Christmas presents was green, the real life villain is orange. Donald Trump is coming for our holiday shopping season.
He is trying to brace Americans for hard times to come, saying that you might only get two dolls for Christmas instead of 30. Now, I didn’t know anyone who got 30 dolls for Christmas when I was growing up, but maybe having a multi-millionaire father gave Trump a different gift experience as a child.
While Trump pledged to start bringing prices down on “day one,” the reality is that signs of rising prices caused by Trump’s tariffs on goods from China are popping up. On Friday, May 2, the “de minimus” exemption for packages worth less than $800 ended by Trump’s order. Some of the fastest-growing online retail platforms were Shein and Temu, which specialized in direct sales from China. Last year Amazon even created a discount section that also featured direct from China sales. In the last week of April, prices started to rise on fast fashion online sales platforms such as Shein and Temu. The price increases more than doubled many of their prices. Then Temu stopped selling direct from China, relying on stock from U.S. warehouses.
Microsoft has also raised the price of their Xbox consoles by 20% or more claiming that “market conditions” were to blame. The real reason is that 75% or more of all gaming consoles, by the three major companies (Microsoft, Sony, and Nintendo,) are made in China, with most the rest made in Mexico and Vietnam.
Other companies that announced price increases in April and May included Stanley Black & Decker, which raised prices on their tools. Baby product company Evenflo announced prices would go up around May 1.
Even products that are made in the U.S.A. are seeing costs go up and are raising their prices. With Trump’s across the board 10% tariffs, all imported parts and raw materials have gone up in price, causing businesses to raise their prices. But companies that rely on materials that are largely made in China, like silk, are being hit the hardest.
While only a minority of companies are raising prices right now, they are but the tip of the iceberg. More and more companies are announcing future price increases.