It’s not entirely clear to me why tariffs would help your local logistics businesses? Doesn’t the same amount of stuff get moved around , just changes origin? I believe you I just would like to understand

I was shocked when I last visited the USA (from Europe) and saw things like Walmart paper bags labelled "Made in Germany".

Perhaps some of that has been replaced by "Made in USA".

(Day-to-day, I generally don't buy things not made in the EU — packaging, for example, will typically be from Sweden, France or Poland.)

Because it made it possible for domestic production to increase.

Of what? Other stuff? Or packing materials? Or

Packaging is a support industry (other than stock boxes which are bulk manufacturerd for things like moving companies, etc).

So... the more companies making things or shipping things, the more boxes are needed. Financial and govt analysts use the packaging industry as kind of a canary for the general health of mnaufacturing and retail as it is on the end of the long tail for supply chains. Packaging is the first to decline and the last to pick up with the cycles of the economy.

What has been the impact on the distribution in the firm. Have more staff been hired, have more supply contracts been handed out, have worker bonuses increases or has it all flowed to the bottom line?

This is the other side of tariffs that few discuss. It may put import prices up, but it also increases the domestic flow of income.

Which means that those who rely solely on imports pay the cost and those who make the domestic supply get an increase in income as an offset.

We've doubled (or more) in headcount. Mostly in the 'special projects' area (complex shippers, partitions, pallets, parts movers, etc) and truck drivers (we have our own trucking company)

Our prices are primarily pegged to what brown paper is (used to make corrugated) which ebbs and flows. Our prices were affected a little because a lot of pulp and raw material comes from Canada (they sell soft wood incredibly cheap... it's actually been a point of contention in our treaty for decades) but the cost change has been fairly slight (close to inflation).

Labor prices have gone up a decent amount and so has health care. We've found savings in increased efficiency due to scaling up production (there are some big fixed costs wrt machinery that becomes a smaller piece of the pie with increased production).

Nobody imports boxes... cost of transport is more than the product which is why almost all box makers have regional plants.

> Pre-COVID we were at ~$25MM yearly and now we are $150MM+ and growing steadily.

And you think this is due to tariffs? If so, please provide some details.

Manufacturing is booming in the Midwest which is the region we service. They have more business, we have more business.

Given the sheer volume of cheap stuff that had been coming straight from China, and the end of de minimus, my first guess would be the majority of this is Chinese and other foreign goods that are now being imported in bulk to minimize duties and costs of handling paperwork, then distributed state-side. Lots of new business (and resulting extra costs to consumers) in logistics, without as much of an increase on the manufacturing side.

I mean, it’s not like US clothes manufacturers, for example, can compete with East Asia even with 100% tariffs (on the wholesale price). Not even close. Ditto electronics, most toys, et c. Lots and lots of really high-volume stuff that was getting drop shipped through e.g. Amazon sellers, not to mention lots of traditional US brands that were shipping straight from overseas warehouses.

our main customers are industrial manufacturers (the midwest is the heart of manufacturing and warehousing for the US)

some of our clients are Tesla, Toyota, Thyssenkrup, Caterpillar, Amazon, Rolls Royce Allison, Cummins.

Ah, mostly big, durable stuff. Interesting, that’s a very different sort of thing than the cheap consumer goods I had in mind.