If the topic of tariffs and global trade sounds like something that’s not part of your everyday world, just consider the deodorant you put on everyday. Some brands use an aluminum-free alternative to fight the bacteria that make you less fragrant. That alternative is likely coconut oil.
“I don’t know about you, but the last time I took a walk in the Wisconsin woods, I didn’t see a heck of a lot of palm trees,” said Kyle LaFond, a Mount Horeb maker of personal care products. “We’re importing a whole bunch of coconut oil.”
LaFond started American Provenance and Natural Contract Manufacturing, a company that’s using only natural products to make about 70 different brands of deodorants, after-shave, lip balms, and more. But President Donald Trump’s ongoing trade wars have caused chaos in pricing and shaken entrepreneurial confidence.
“Some of our inputs went up anywhere from 30% to 300% last year for the first several months,” LaFond said. “Those were costs that I just absorbed. I swallowed them. Unfortunately, I couldn’t continue to do that, so I had to raise my prices.”
LaFond was far from alone. A report from a small business coalition estimated Wisconsin importers paid around $3.5 billion in tariffs between March and December 2025.
“That meant an additional $150,000 in unanticipated costs last year,” LaFond said.
LaFond is unlikely to see any refunds that he could share with his customers, he says, because tariffs are first paid by brokers and other “middlemen” who import in bulk and pass the tariff costs onto small businesses like his. Those middle purchasers would be more likely to see any refunds after the US Supreme Court in February struck down many of Trump’s tariffs.
The defeat has not deterred Trump from trying to get around the highest court in the land.
Wisconsin’s Kaul joins the latest tariff pushback
Attorneys general from 22 states, including Wisconsin’s Josh Kaul, are asking United States Trade Representative Jamieson Greer to not move forward with Trump’s latest attempt to justify broad tariffs: a claim that they are being implemented in order to punish countries that have not done enough to push back against the use of forced labor in global trade.
Which countries? Kaul and his counterparts say Trump is trying to impose new tariffs on every country in the European Union and 59 more, which together account for 99.4% of all goods imported in the United States, making it clear the move is a naked attempt at circumventing the Supreme Court.
“The Trump administration’s illegal tariffs have been harmful to the economy and made life less affordable for Wisconsin families,” said Kaul. “President Trump needs to let go of his fixation with tariffs.”
This latest effort would mark the 63rd attempt at instituting some kind of tariff or other penalty against America’s trading partners.
‘We can’t forecast. We can’t plan.’
For LaFond, the president’s fixation on disrupting global trade makes the already volatile job of operating a small business even harder.
“With all the chaos and uncertainty this administration has caused, we simply can’t forecast.” LaFond said. “We can’t plan. We can’t look toward the future and remain optimistic. A lot of these decisions [by Trump] are made on a whim. There’s no strategy. There’s no forethought. It’s just going off of one man’s impulsive decision making.”
Bothering LaFond further is Trump’s insistence that record highs in the stock market are proof that the US economy is healthy, despite 95% of Americans saying there is an affordability crisis.
“The stock market is not the economy,” LaFond said. “The stock market anticipates the future earnings of large companies. The stock market may be going great, but the folks on Main Street are struggling. You hear folks in Washington, DC talking about ballrooms and arches. It’s disrespectful. It’s out of touch. And it’s tone deaf.”
