Amazon emails sellers to gauge how Trump’s tariffs are impacting their businesses

Amazon is reaching out to third-party retailers, who account for almost all of merchandise the corporate sells, to gauge how President Donald Trump’s sweeping tariffs are affecting their businesses.

Members of Amazon’s vendor relations staff started contacting some U.S. retailers final week, in accordance to an e-mail seen by CNBC. The e-mail asks how the “present U.S. tariff scenario” has impacted sellers’ sourcing and pricing methods, logistics operations, and plans to ship items into Amazon warehouses.

“I wished to open a dialogue concerning the present U.S. tariff scenario and how it is affecting our businesses on Amazon, notably by way of logistics,” the e-mail says. “As of April 2025, we’re nonetheless coping with the repercussions of varied tariff insurance policies, and I consider it is essential for us that you simply share present experiences and techniques.”

Representatives from Amazon did not instantly reply to a request for touch upon the e-mail, which was reported earlier by The Wall Road Journal. Business publication Fashionable Retail coated the e-mail on Monday.

Corporations of all sizes are digesting the influence of Trump’s new tariffs. Earlier this month, the president signed an government order imposing a far-reaching plan, however inside days he reversed course and dropped country-specific tariffs down to a common 10% charge for all commerce companions besides China, which faces tariffs of 145%, together with a fentanyl-related levy imposed in February and March. Inventory and bond markets have fluctuated wildly previously two weeks.

The levies on items from China may very well be notably burdensome for the hundreds of thousands of businesses that depend on Amazon’s third-party market and supply a lot of their merchandise from the world’s second-largest financial system. Third-party sellers now account for about 60% of all merchandise bought on Amazon’s web site.

Some Amazon sellers informed CNBC they plan to maintain regular on costs for so long as they’ll to stay aggressive, however that the added price of the tariffs may in the end put them out of enterprise if they continue to be in place.

Amazon CEO Andy Jassy mentioned final week that some sellers might find yourself passing the price of tariffs onto shoppers within the type of larger costs.

“I perceive why, I imply, relying on which nation you are in, you do not have 50% further margin that you could play with,” Jassy mentioned Thursday in an interview with CNBC’s Andrew Ross Sorkin.

The tariffs have affected different elements of Amazon’s retail enterprise. Final week, the corporate started to cancel some direct import orders for merchandise sourced by distributors in China, consultants informed CNBC. Some distributors of dwelling items and kitchen accent gadgets had merchandise prepared for pickup by Amazon at delivery ports, solely to study that their orders have been canceled.

Amazon shares are down 18% thus far this yr, whereas the Nasdaq has fallen 13%.