With negotiations ongoing, pressure from financial markets and the sense that Donald Trump can change his mind on the flip of a dime, it's hard to tell what the effects of the US president’s “reciprocal” trade tariffs will be. But they’re likely to have big consequences for the bike industry.
On April 2, Trump imposed huge taxes on imports from China, Vietnam, Taiwan, Thailand and other nations, as part of the White House’s ‘Liberation Day’. Writing for the trade publication BikeBiz, Dominic Langan, CEO of Madison, UK distributors for Shimano, Park Tool and more, described these countries as the “beating heart of the global cycling supply chain”.
“For an industry still navigating oversupply, squeezed margins and consumer price sensitivity, this couldn’t have come at a worse time,” Langan wrote, saying…