"Apparel Import Bookings Down Nearly 60% Ahead of ‘Reciprocal’ Tariffs", 14 April 2025

Ahead of the tariffs President Donald Trump slapped on just about every country worldwide, apparel sellers began drastically pulling back imports into the U.S.

According to data from supply chain visibility provider Vizion, apparel saw a 59.1 percent weekly decline in import bookings on the week of March 31—the highest rate among product type across all countries. This covers apparel under HS (harmonized system) code 62, which includes items like shirts, shorts, pants, overcoats, suits, dresses and skirts...

Various reports have already indicated that Amazon has already put the kibosh on select orders out of China amid a potential decoupling in U.S.-China relations, while specialty discount retailer Five Below has asked vendors to suspend products exiting the country. It remains unclear if the memo, sent out by its container shipping partner Maersk, went out to all Five Below vendors or a subset...

Maersk’s notice, first reported by Bloomberg, indicated that no containers are to be delivered to shipyards starting Thursday, and all containers that are loaded must be unpacked and returned to the carrier.

China is the largest source for Five Below merchandise, with company stock dropping nearly 10 percent through Friday morning after the report. The stock improved to a drop of 2.5 percent by end-of-day trading.

The collapse in import bookings across the board came as many other companies cancelled, paused or delayed inventory out of Asian countries ahead of President Trump’s Wednesday announcement that he would give a 90-day reprieve to the “reciprocal” tariff duties he hit them with the week prior.

With that statement, tariffs for most countries were scaled back to a 10-percent baseline, while duties on Chinese imports were escalated to 125 percent (not counting additional 20-percent punitive fentanyl-related tariffs).

Even as the tariffs have eased up in most sourcing countries like Vietnam and Cambodia, apparel retailers still have to grapple with the added costs...

Henderson expects some product shortages to start to hit retailers in the summer months as the shipments into the U.S. cool down...