The effect of tariffs has left companies scrambling to help sort out domestic and international business and that includes Erie-based business, Logistics Plus.

Gretchen Blough works in the Customs Brokerage Division at Logistics Plus and said, "The impact on the supply chain we thought was big during Covid and this looks to surpass that."


Blough has been helping customers navigate the business of imports and exports since the announcement of tariffs. According to Blough, "There's a lot of unpredictability, it's hard to plan. Looking at it from an import perspective like I do, it's hard to get an inland costs as things change, but it's also hard to plan from an export perspective because these other countries that we have these tariffs against planned to retaliate."


Staff at Logistics Plus said tariffs not only effects foreign, but domestic business too. Yuriy Ostapyak, the C.O.O. of Logistics Plus said, "Majority of the U.S. manufactures import a lot of components and a lot of these components with much larger increase in price will increase the price of the end goods to the consumer."


When the possibility of tariffs were first announced, staff said they tried to prepare and were worried about the lasting effects. According to Ostapyak, "We were concerned because we knew a broad implementation of tariffs would absolutely throw entire world trade into a tail spin."

Staff said they don't know the duration of the tariffs which is why they are keeping their customers informed about any changes that happen daily or even by the hour. "We don't know how long this will last. There's already talks about lessening the tariffs and as rapidly as they came on, there's the possibility that based on negations and on the stock market, some of these can be loosened or canceled or changed", said Ostapyak.


Some of the top questions staff say they have been getting from clients have been about imports, duty rates, landing costs, cut off periods for tariffs and exemptions to certain items if they are already in transit.

Staff said they have been doing their best to give their clients the most up to date information, even with it constantly changing.