Atlanta, Georgia — Pillows filled and sealed for a good night’s sleep at the Atlanta warehouse of home bedding company Standard Fiber are one of many things giving its CEO, Chad Altbaier, nightmares.
“Planning is practically impossible,” Altbaier told CBS News. “Probably the most challenging time of my career.”
Nevada-based Standard Fiber is the middleman between Chinese producers of sheets, towels and curtains — and American buyers such as Walmart and Target.
“We’re already having customers that are reducing their order quantities because they’re concerned about the higher price points, and a consumer responding to that by buying less,” Altbaier said.
When U.S. tariffs on China reached triple digits earlier this year, retailers canceled their orders. Now, with the tariffs at 30%, some of those retailers want goods from China shipped immediately. That temporary 90-day deal, reached in mid-May, is set to run through mid-August. In June, both nations announced that they had reached a tentative agreement on a more permanent trade deal, although it has not yet been finalized.
“You can’t walk into a Walmart or a Target or a Costco or a Home Goods and have nothing to sell,” Altbaier said. “The question really is how much product is going to be there and at what price point.”
A recent report from the Institute for Supply Management finds manufacturers are still seeing a decline in orders from customers. Overall import activity into the U.S. fell to 39.9% in May, a 16-year low, the report found. Many blame tariffs and economic uncertainty for the drop.
Even with two manufacturing sites in the U.S., Altbaier says it’s still not possible to move home textile production completely out of Asia.
“We don’t have the infrastructure,” Altbaier said. “We don’t have the workforce. We don’t have the experience. We don’t have the raw materials here.”
Standard Fiber has moved some production from China to other Asian countries, but Altbaier says that will still cause a large price increase. Being the middleman isn’t easy.
Revenue losses from tariffs forced Standard Fiber to cut about 45 of its 250 workers, Altbaier said.
“What keeps me up at night is the not knowing part,” Altbaier said. “And then not being able to control these unprecedented, you know, tariff situations that are, frankly, wreaking havoc on the world, not just the U.S., and not just our industry.”
Skyler Henry is a CBS News correspondent based in Atlanta. Henry was most recently a correspondent for CBS Newspath in Washington.
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