The 'Trump Tariffs' change and how that affects orders from me, to the USA

Preface

It's all over international news, along with more and more businesses and couriers announcing their short term decisions on how they're handling orders and shipments to the USA in coming weeks/months, so I suspect you all will be well aware of these ongoings already. I know full well there are much larger fish in the sea than little ol' James' Home of Tone, but nonetheless, I have worked hard over the past few years at providing a quality, affordable product to my growing US customer base, and ultimately, these Trump Tariffs will affect that in some way, I wish it didn't but that's the situation we're in going forward

I have been hard at work learning more about this, ensuring what I do, how I export, how I serve my US customers is completely correct. But similarly with the recent EU changes too, there will be short term, and long term changes in how I handle orders heading to the USA going forward. I'll update this page as and when I learn more, or when I make key changes, but I hope this info helps.

Summary

I must admit, I'm getting pretty exhausted reading government export and import changes across the world the past few years, it has been a challenging time for absolutely anyone shipping and receiving goods that's for sure.

The latest major changes are focussed on the USA and Trump's focus on Tariffs. From the 29th August 2025, the USA's ‘de minimis’ duties threshold of  US$800 has been waved goodbye, and from that point onward, ALL goods entering the USA, regardless of their value, will be subject to tariffs. Yes, it's a lot of work for businesses but ultimately, you, the consumer based in the USA, that will be the hardest hit by all of this, so you do certainly have my sympathies. 

Shipping options and what this entails

I have exclusively, unless a specific scenario required something different, shipped to my USA based customers using Royal Mail International Tracked postal services, which transfer over to USPS once in the USA.
The main change to be able to continue using this service, is that I will need to accurately calculate and take payment for your import Tariffs at the time of purchase via my invoice/checkout process.
Royal Mail have created a method of assisting Royal Mail Business account customers like myself in handling this, which is one step closer to making it all more seemless thankfully. However, trying to implement a method of accurately calculating the correct tariffs for each type of product, is the trickier part. Due to the wide variety of items I stock and sell, from a variety of brands across the world, all of these will need to be handled differently, so to have something automated at the checkout to handle this is the challenge here. I have been speaking with Shopify app developers who already have apps in place that assist with achieving this, but that too has it's limits.

Shopify (who I use for my website) only allow customisations and additional apps added onto the checkout process on 'PLUS' Shopify accounts, a service that costs $2300 per month! Yup, for a one man, small business like mine that's simply not even close to being viable right now. So I am trying to figure out a viable way of sorting this at the checkout so you can continue to order as conveniently as before. 

Shipments sent with faster courier services such as FedEx, DHL or UPS for example however, I won't be obligated to handle the fees up front/at the time of checkout, so all of your relevant importing fees to the US government and customs, will be handled by the courier and paid to them.
It is just my job to ensure the full declaration documentation is complete and accurate, which of course I already do on every international shipment already. So it may be that I only have fast courier services available on the normal website checkout process, as those are simpler my end to process. Just keep in mind, you will be charged by the courier for the relevant tariffs.

Conclusion (in the short term)

As such, I think in the very short term, it will actually be better for me and importantly for you, if orders to the USA are handled manually. Not through the website's checkout.

So it will be best if you contact me via email, with some info about the item(s) you are hoping to place an order for. I will then look into which shipping method will be best to use based on your order. Both looking at the physically shipping costs, and how the import tariffs/duty/taxes etc will be calculated for you. I have already had a few orders handled this way since implementing this short term solution and it has been a simple process, just perhaps not quite as simple as you just popping the order through on the website as before unfortunately. 

I am confident in saying that the most frustrated people dealing with all of this will be you, the consumer in the USA. I'm just one micro business in the UK, but I have felt very proud that customers in the USA have trusted me enough to place orders with. I do wish to continue with that, and I'm not drawing a line through it by any means. But it's complex, and ensuring that I do everything correctly is important so respectfully, I think this method at least in the short term, is the only way I feel comfortable. 

So currently, if you're in the US, you can't simply place an order on the website as before. But you can definitely still place an order via me manually, so just drop me an email (james@homeoftone.co.uk) and I will look into the best method to do it for you. 

James