AUSTIN, Texas — Robby Pettinato, the Chief Operating Officer for Toy Joy, says price increases are nothing new. During the COVID-19 pandemic, he saw how increased shipping costs affected pricing from their manufacturers.
“The scary thing that we learned, however, is once vendors raise pricing, whether it’s for tariffs or shipping or anything, they never go back down,” Pettinato said.
Very few toy companies manufacture everything in the U.S., and with President Trump’s sweeping new tariffs, Pettinato says the company’s vendors had to raise their prices.
“Our cost of rent doesn’t change and our staffing needs don’t change,” Pettinato said. “So for us to retain that same level of revenue, we have to increase our prices to compensate for what the vendors have to charge us.”
Professor Dr. Jeremi Suri, a history professor at UT Austin, said he expects the tariffs to affect small businesses the most since their margins do not allow them to lose money.
“By some estimates, most families will pay $4,000 more a year just to buy the same stuff they’re buying right now,” Suri said. “So we are likely to see more small businesses in Austin going out of business.”
While Pettinato says it is hard to say when Austinites can start seeing the price increases from the tariffs, he fears for the future.
“No one’s gonna make more money because of the tariffs,” Pettinato said. “It’s a genuinely disconcerting time for small businesses everywhere. Not just in Austin, not just even in the U.S. This is a worldwide massive, like upward pressure on our survival as a business.”