More than three-quarters of companies in the U.S. and Europe are already losing profits due to the effects of tariffs, according to a recent poll.
The survey, commissioned by pricing management software developer Enable and conducted by Censuswide in late June, included 1,500 senior pricing leaders across the industrial, distribution, retail and consumer goods sectors in the U.S., U.K. and the “DACH” nations in central Europe.
According to those officials, 76% of their companies had already experienced profit losses attributed to tariffs by early this summer.
In addition, 91% reported that they feared the impacts of tariffs over the following 12 months — with one-third indicating that they were “extremely concerned” — and 84% said that their business planned to raise prices to offset their effects.
Nearly 60%, however, indicated that implementing those price changes could take weeks or months, which Enable officials said exposed “a dangerous gap between the speed of tariff changes and businesses' ability to respond.” More than one-quarter of respondents said that they lacked confidence in their organization’s pricing strategy.
"With costs shifting unpredictably and 93% of businesses admitting their current pricing responsiveness risks further profit loss, pricing agility has become an essential survival skill,” Enable founder and CEO Andrew Butt said in a statement. “The lag between tariff updates and implementing price changes creates a window where competitors with faster pricing capabilities can capture significant market advantage.”
Among other tariff mitigation strategies, more than half of survey participants intended to reduce costs in other areas, and 46% admitted that their company considered reducing activity or withdrawing entirely from markets with high tariffs.
