The JOOR Tariff Toolkit: 6 Tips for Fashion Brands and Retailers

New tariffs imposed by the American government are disrupting the retail industry. This guide details six steps fashion brands and retailers can take to minimize the impact of tariffs, including adjusting distribution, highlighting current Available to Sell inventory, strategically examining pricing, communicating key information with buyers, and re-examining payment terms.

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This toolkit also includes practical instructions and advice on how brands and retailers can use JOOR’s exclusive features, including JOOR Pay and JOOR Discover, to implement these tips quickly and effectively for maximum business growth.

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What is a Tariff?

A tariff is a tax imposed by the government on imported goods when the goods enter the country. While they can be used to protect domestic industries from foreign competition, they also cause price fluctuations, which can create financial difficulties and unpredictability for brands and retailers trying to best manage their business.

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How Are Tariffs Affecting the Fashion Industry?

The American government recently imposed hefty duties on many countries, including several that are key fashion manufacturing locations. The Yale Budget Lab reported that ‘the 2025 tariffs disproportionately affect clothing and textiles’, and as a result, these new costs have sent the retail industry into a state of panic as businesses try to protect revenue and profit margin.

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The United States Fashion Industry Association released a statement expressing concern about the implications of a potential trade war, explaining ‘fashion benefits from the opportunity to source across the globe.’ US fashion brands that produce clothing in affected countries are now facing the decision of how to adjust to these new additional sourcing costs, with many considering passing them on to consumers.

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Fashion brands outside of America that rely on US consumers also find their businesses impacted as their goods now become much more expensive when selling to the American market.

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While tariffs are currently a dynamic topic, reflective of ongoing negotiations, responses, and policy updates, this complex issue is crucial for brands and retailers to prepare for given its significant ramifications throughout the fashion industry.

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How Can Fashion Brands and Retailers Tackle Tariffs?

‍If you’re looking to protect your business from the potential impact of tariffs, here are six strategic steps to help your fashion business best navigate this period of uncertainty.

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1) Adjust Your Geographic Distribution to Minimize Impact

Instead of entering panic mode, see the tariffs as an opportunity to explore new retail partners for your brand. JOOR transaction data reveals that non-US brands conducting business with American retailers on average generate 20% of their sales from the US market. A significant 21% of these brands are highly exposed to the US market, driving more than half of their sales from American partnerships.

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If you’re based outside the US but sell to a significant number of US-based retailers, now is the perfect time to explore other retail connections in new or growing markets like APAC.

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If you’re based in the US but sell outside of your home market, you may soon face retaliatory tariffs, which could cause international buyers to pull back on US orders. Prepare your business for this eventuality by exploring more domestic retailers to diversify your distribution.

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Use our newly launched JOOR Discover solution to identify and connect with new retailers both domestically and across the globe. The location filters allow you to easily identify the right retailers no matter which direction you are looking to adjust your wholesale strategy in the face of tariffs, and JOOR’s exclusive directory of vetted retailers provides you with the ability to directly contact these buyers.

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Retailer Tip:

As you adjust your assortment in response to new tariffs, you may need to source new resources for your store. Discover new brands using the Find New Brands directory or explore a curated selection of brands with JOOR Passport, our digital trade shows. Be sure to view the “Brands Interested In You” section found in your top navigation bar to see all the brands that want to partner with you.

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2) Highlight Available to Sell Inventory at Pre-tariff Pricing

Inventory imported before tariffs go into effect is now a valuable commodity, as the same goods will be more expensive to produce in the future. Let retailers know that you have inventory available to ship immediately and emphasize that there’s a high likelihood this product won’t be available at this price again anytime soon.

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JOOR already provides retailers with clear visibility of Available to Sell (ATS) inventory, but we recommend creating a dedicated ATS linesheet for buyers. You can choose to only share your linesheet with select retailers, and you can also add a delivery window so buyers can see exactly how soon they will have the product in their hands.

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Retailer Tip:

To shop Available to Sell inventory on existing linesheets shared by brands, simply click hide sold-out styles. If the brand has not enabled this filter on JOOR, reach out directly to see what they have available to sell. It’s quite probable that brands will be willing to negotiate more in this current climate.

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3) Strategically Adjust Your Pricing

When faced with the impact of tariffs on your cost structure, you may be tempted to raise prices across the board, but a one-size-fits-all approach is likely not the right answer. To help recoup some of your potential revenue lost to tariffs, think strategically and selectively about which of your products have the room to increase pricing without negatively impacting orders.

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Do you have any higher margin products where you can absorb the cost versus lower margin goods where you need to raise the price? Assessing your pricing model can also have a significant impact on your cost structure.

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Consider the range of options available to you and which will be the right choice for your business:

• FOB (Free On Board): The buyer takes on more responsibility and risk during shipping.
• CIF (Cost, Insurance, and Freight): The seller handles shipping and insurance costs, but risk transfers during transit.
• DDP (Delivered Duty Paid): The seller takes on the most responsibility, delivering the goods to the buyer's destination.

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If you choose to opt for a price increase, be strategic in where and how much you increase prices to minimize any reduction in orders. Instead of raising the price across all products, look at them on a case by case basis.

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We suggest protecting your core drivers and inventory of basics and instead focus on raising prices for fashion products. When it comes to deciding price, look at price breaks and perceived value - for example, increasing a price from $98 to $118 feels like a much bigger jump than increasing from $148 to $168.

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Remember, brands on JOOR have the flexibility to adjust pricing for styles. You can easily assign multiple prices per style to implement different pricing strategies and create customized pricing for different retailers.

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You can also incentivize larger orders by offering volume discounts for retailers. While this won’t eliminate the cost of tariffs, pushing for larger orders will increase your overall sales volume and help you to negotiate volume discounts in your production costs.

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Retailer Tip:

Look out for offers and incentives from brands as they implement strategies in response to tariffs. There may be opportunities to discuss discounts, and brands may also be open to larger or smaller orders than normal. In this environment, brands will value a collaborative approach as they look to increase flexibility and create mutually beneficial partnerships.

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4) Communicate Proactively With Buyers

The current uncertainty can easily cause confusion, so it’s important to keep buyers informed on how your brand plans to navigate the impact of tariffs. Use JOOR’s in-platform messaging to conveniently send messages to individual buyers or send broader communications to multiple buyers at once, sharing relevant updates on your plans.

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We also recommend updating your Custom Profile and leveraging this as a valuable resource to communicate transparently with retailers. Think of it as your brand’s personal B2B e-commerce site.

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We suggest creating a new page within your brand profile where you can highlight specific content related to tariffs, as well as any products you wish to push during this time. Use this page to share information and pricing updates with retailers, or, if you are a US brand with a non-US warehouse, you can create a page to promote this and let retailers know you can ship goods without additional tariff costs built in.

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Retailer Tip:

Check the JOOR profiles of the brands you work with to get a better understanding of how they’ll be working through the tariff situation. If there’s anything you’re unsure about, don’t hesitate to reach out to the brand directly.

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5) Convey Product Details to Inform Purchase Decisions

Now more than ever, it’s incredibly important to share accurate product information with retailers. Product choices will be examined closely as buyers try to make the most informed shopping decisions, so highlighting assortment opportunities within your collections and linesheets is essential.

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Retailers will be on the lookout for products not subject to tariffs, so be sure to provide accurate and complete information in each style’s Product Details, such as country of origin or where you’re shipping from.

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Use JOOR’s style information tools to create a Style Badge to signify where a product is manufactured and/or if it's tariff-free. Assign a badge to each style, and these will be seen by all retailers on linesheets which have been shared with them—a great way to highlight product opportunities to your buyers. You can also use Style Tags to signify the country of origin so that retailers can easily filter by this for tariff calculations.

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Retailer Tip:

Remember to view a style's Product Details to fully understand the country of origin and filter products by Style Badges and Tags to find items that can be shipped tariff-free or for a special discount.

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6) Re-evaluate Payment Terms to Maintain Healthy Retail Partnerships

Whether you are absorbing tariff costs or passing them on in the form of price increases, think about how you can adjust your financial terms to ensure a continued productive relationship between brand and retailer.

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If your brand is choosing to absorb tariff costs, use JOOR Pay to request deposits to help with cash flow. Retailers should be more understanding during these uncertain times and many should be willing to be more flexible with their finance options.

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If you need your retail partners to bear some of the costs but you don’t want to adjust product pricing, you also can use JOOR Pay to add a custom fee to the order. This allows you to capture additional revenue to cover the extra tariff cost and is a technique we expect many brands to adopt.

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How JOOR Can Help in Times of Uncertainty

In times of uncertainty, having practical tools and trusted partners you can rely on are essential and JOOR provides brands and retailers with both.

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Our platform not only equips you with the latest technology so you can make dynamic business changes in an instant, but it also gives you access to our vast, vetted network of fashion companies from around the globe for the best chance of business growth no matter what the current fashion landscape looks like.

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To learn more about how we can help you succeed during this changing retail environment, request a demo today.

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