Special Questions

Texas Manufacturing Outlook Survey

Data were collected April 15–23, and 83 Texas manufacturers responded to the survey.

NOTE: 82 responses.

NOTE: 82 responses.

NOTES: 82 responses. We asked a similar question in April 2018, Sept. 2018, June 2019 and Dec. 2019 after tariffs were implemented by the first Trump administration.

NOTES: 71 responses. This question was only posed to those answering yes to question 3, but the results shown are calculated as the share of all firms, where those answering no to question 3 are included under “No impact.” We asked a similar question in Sept. 2018 and June 2019after tariffs were implemented by the first Trump administration./p>

NOTES: 54 responses. This question was only posed to those answering “Yes, negative impact” to question 3.

NOTES: 41 responses. This question was only posed to those answering "Passing cost increases through to customers" to question 5.

NOTES: 41 responses. This question was only posed to those answering "Passing cost increases through to customers" to question 5.

Survey respondents were given the opportunity to also provide comments, which can be found in the Comments tab above.

Texas Service Sector Outlook Survey

Data were collected April 15–23, and 273 Texas business executives responded to the survey.

NOTE: 267 responses.

NOTE: 267 responses.

NOTES: 266 responses. We asked a similar question in April 2018, Sept. 2018, June 2019 and Dec. 2019 after tariffs were implemented by the first Trump administration.

NOTES: 201 responses. This question was only posed to those answering yes to question 3, but the results shown are calculated as the share of all firms, where those answering no to question 3 are included under “No impact.” We asked a similar question in Sept. 2018 and June 2019after tariffs were implemented by the first Trump administration.

NOTES: 147 responses. This question was only posed to those answering “Yes, negative impact” to question 3.

NOTES: 69 responses. This question was only posed to those answering "Passing cost increases through to customers" to question 5.

NOTES: 70 responses. This question was only posed to those answering "Passing cost increases through to customers" to question 5.

Survey respondents were given the opportunity to also provide comments, which can be found in the Comments tab above.

Texas Retail Outlook Survey

Data were collected April 15–23, and 47 Texas retailers responded to the survey.

NOTE: 46 responses.

NOTE: 46 responses.

NOTES: 45 responses. We asked a similar question in April 2018, Sept. 2018, June 2019 and Dec. 2019 after tariffs were implemented by the first Trump administration.

NOTES: 37 responses. This question was only posed to those answering yes to question 3, but the results shown are calculated as the share of all firms, where those answering no to question 3 are included under “No impact.” We asked a similar question in Sept. 2018 and June 2019after tariffs were implemented by the first Trump administration.

NOTES: 33 responses. This question was only posed to those answering “Yes, negative impact” to question 3.

NOTES: 25 responses. This question was only posed to those answering "Passing cost increases through to customers" to question 5.

NOTES: 25 responses. This question was only posed to those answering "Passing cost increases through to customers" to question 5.

Special Questions Comments

Survey participants are given the opportunity to submit comments. Some comments have been edited for grammar and clarity.

• We are a large exporter. The tariffs are impacting our export business, with uncertainty and stranded products that cannot be delivered or that we are trying to move to other markets while in mid-shipment. We do have foreign sources for critical materials, particularly catalysts that are not available from U.S. suppliers, and increases in steel costs are impacting our capital plans here in the U.S. causing us to regroup and slow projects or cancel where we would like to make investment here in the U.S.

• A lack of a plan and the arbitrary nature of the tariffs are killing business.
• There are positive and negative impacts of tariffs on our business. As we are an American manufacturer, it is positive protection to our business against cheap and low-labor-cost manufacturers around the world. The negative impact obviously is higher prices for our products as we are absorbing some of the increase against our margins to stay competitive in the business.
• We have been actively keeping our prices lower and passing on tariffs to our customers as incurred. With the recent changes, we are now experiencing pushback from customers in the form of delayed orders. They want to wait to see what happens, but that means our business is suddenly impacted by reduction of activity while uncertainty looms. At the same time, many shipments that we cannot stop are being impacted by tariffs that were not in place when purchase orders were issued. We cannot delay some of these expenses nor did we have the opportunity to buy before implementation of tariffs specifically related to China. In our industry, we cannot buy certain components from anywhere other than China, so this negatively impacts us immediately, and because trade policy has included tariffs on the world, we find ourselves unable to compete for international business. Simply put, if the end user is outside the U.S., companies are not having it [the product] made in the U.S. The tariffs make that almost impossible, limiting us to domestic markets only. We have already had a customer switch production for international destinations to Australia for this reason. We have seen opportunities to gain other business from Australia get sidelined in the last three weeks. Reduction of markets and increases in cost are not a good recipe to be competitive in the marketplace. I cannot emphasize enough how absolutely terrible this is in the short term and how the daily changes in policy make it impossible to attract new business currently because we cannot quote it with accuracy. Two projects that were over two years in the making are now on hold until we know what will ultimately happen with tariffs.
• Because of statements by President Trump during his election campaign that he would implement tariffs if elected and his subsequent election, I pulled in deliveries of all our foreign-sourced components and the foreign-sourced materials required to support my business in fiscal year 2025, so at this time, President Trump's tariffs will not have a large impact on my business, but if this tariff nonsense continues into next year, then I would expect the tariffs to start to impact my business profits negatively.

• While most consider only the negatives to tariffs, there are positives that some of our divisions benefit from. What is negative to both winners and losers is this environment of uncertainty that businesses cannot plan and work through.
• Tariff uncertainty and the timeline have created significant chaos.

• I would tend to say tariffs will impact us negatively since prices will rise in the face of large governmental employee layoffs and the inability of wages/benefits to keep up.
• It remains to be seen, but I imagine tariffs will have an overall negative effect on the economy, so we may be impacted by that. If beef exports slow, raw material input costs may go down for me, so that would be positive.
• We are in the ag commodity processing and marketing business (cottonseed). The inability to export the main product (cotton) and resulting low prices are causing reduction in planted acres just when we are barely surviving three successive years of drought. Input and raw material costs keep increasing due to short supply, while demand is being destroyed by high prices and unreliable supply. Consolidation is happening rapidly in our industry, and infrastructure is in real danger.

• We get tungsten from China, and it is the only tungsten available due to conflict minerals.

• We have seen some impact on materials pricing due to the current tariffs. While we do attempt to source domestically, it is in many cases difficult to remain competitive when using U.S. pricing. Many of our products are functionally a commodity and readily available at some competitors, and in many cases, at a better price. We pride ourselves on our quality, but when a customer can purchase three of the same item for the price of one, it makes it difficult to compete. In order to remain competitive, we must source our materials from suppliers in India, China and other Asian countries. While our customers haven't come back to us with requests for pricing concessions, it is coming. A 145 percent tariff to China is excessive and not maintainable for keeping businesses and the economy as a whole, functional.

• Recession concern will impact demand.

• With little clarity on long-term tariff plans, we are stuck in limbo. We know price increases from suppliers are coming, but everyone seems to be waiting until deals hopefully finalize. It is very uncertain. From conversations with peer companies, we all feel stuck and are unsure of what the future holds. Hopefully, there is more clarity coming in the next few weeks.

• President Trump needs to understand the ramification of his trade policy.

• I’ve recently started providing recruiting services for Israeli tech companies expanding into the U.S. and looking to build out their teams here. We’ll see if the current situation has any impact, but at this point, I don’t anticipate significant changes.
• Our big concern is the input costs of our customers. We are engineers that design buildings and similar structures. Our input costs won't change. We are more concerned about inflation of construction materials and whether those costs discourage our clients from perusing new projects.
• It’s unclear which tariffs may affect clients and whether they will be imposed for any material period of time. Steel tariffs will have the greatest impact.
• In response to the numerous uncertainties with prices and tariffs, we will continue to focus on what still works and quickly implement strategic adjustments in procurement, contracting, personnel and risk management practices.
• Not many, but a few larger clients are expressing a wait-and-see approach. These are mostly coming from green hydrogen and ammonia projects. However, land and commercial development continues to outpace activity from last year.
• Tariffs keep changing, so it's hard to make decisions right now.
• Tariffs impact primarily larger companies that shipped off American jobs to foreign countries. As trade and production resets to more “Made in USA,” we expect disruption, such as delays or higher prices but not directly in proportion to tariff percentage due to businesses absorbing costs or investing in technology to reduce operating expenses. We believe the time frame and severity of disruption will be reduced with AI [artificial intelligence] and automation enabling U.S. production to spin up much faster than ever.
• Tariffs should have no significant direct impact on our business. However, they may have a significant impact on our clients' business, which may have an impact on our business volume.
• Tariffs will impact our operations in cost of materials equipment used in our labs and our construction projects for clients. We will pass along costs as we procure supplies and equipment. Being in consulting engineering, our biggest concern is the impact of tariffs on energy and chemical manufacturing companies. If those companies are negatively impacted by tariffs, it will negatively affect our engineering services for them.
• As a sole-proprietor consulting business, I really don't have any expenditures that will be impacted. My revenue will take a hit as the companies that I do work for will not be expanding due to uncertainty. Policy gets changed every time you turn around. There is no stability. As you well know, the only businesses that make money in uncertain times are financial traders, and they are making a killing.

• We will soon feel the impact that tariffs will have on leisure travel, airline fares, hotels and transportation services.
• It will be a never-ending process of passing costs—the COVID cost, the tariff cost, the "add name here" cost. We have to have adults back in charge or these changes will take this country down.
• My real estate valuation and consulting firm has no reliance on foreign goods. The impact will be the uncertainty created by tariffs in the real estate markets, which chills investments and lending, which reduces the demand for my services.
• Tariffs amplify the overall uncertainty.
• We are a service business, so we do not have input prices or foreign trade. What we see is fear. The reaction to which is to horde cash, buy gold and buy guns—none of which helps our business.

• Basically, we expect supply-chain interruptions and price pressure for our disposables (medical gloves/masks) that come to our suppliers from China, similar to the situation we had during COVID.

• We are a nursing home. Our rates are set by Medicare and Medicaid. They are below what our costs are, and Medicare and Medicaid know this from annual cost reports filed by every nursing home. I am sure that many of our medical supplies are from overseas. However, we purchase them through a medical supply vendor. Recently, we've been buying medical supplies directly from Amazon as their delivery is quicker and costs are lower.

• The approach to tariffs is causing immense uncertainty in the market. We are absorbing most of the cost increases from our Canadian suppliers. It’s a tax on American businesses.

• We are in a supply-demand industry. Currently, in our market, demand is very soft—the softest I have seen in 15 years (COVID notwithstanding).

• The chaotic implementation of the administration's tariff policy and the near-daily changes are wreaking havoc on our business, our customer's business and our suppliers—a self-inflicted pandemic all over again.
• We have services providers in India, Ukraine, Mexico, the Dominican Republic and Germany, such as coders and testers, etc. This is due to pseudo-protectionist European Union regulations like General Data Protection Regulation but also due to cost savings.
• If prices go up and spending goes down, our topline revenue will decrease, and we will have to downsize by laying people off.

• We will be fine. Tariffs will hurt us, but they won't kill us. The equipment rental business is more forgiving than others when it comes to price increases on our rental fleet purchases. However, businesses that exist to sell things only once will be decimated by tariffs. This could be a useful anecdote. My brother's company sells specialty athletic tape and other athletic consumables. They calculated their tariff burden earlier this month and, if all announced tariffs on China are fully implemented, the amount of their customs duty would be three times their EBITDA [earnings before interest, taxes, depreciation and amortization] last year. No business can withstand a shock like that. And no customers will accept price increases this drastic. The company's private-equity owners are considering shuttering the business for the rest of the year until they can find new suppliers.

• If our customers are impacted and begin moving less product, thus decreasing our revenues, we will respond by curtailing capital spending and freezing hiring.
• It is an odd situation for us because we manufacture in Mexico for multiple companies. The tariff impact is negative, but the uptick in companies requesting our services is significant. Many companies are looking to nearshore out of China and other locations, but none are contemplating a relocation to the U.S.

• For us, uncertainty and the squeeze for better prices from customers with smaller budgets seem to be the main issues so far. [We are] mostly a domestic business currently.

• Virtually everyone or anything using electronics is sourcing from outside the U.S.
• You would think there is some risk to the economy from the tariff dealing. We have not seen it yet other than the anticipation of there being a potential impact to the economy. Anxiety over the unknown can influence market behaviors.
• We are in the nonprime lending space, and while tariffs have no direct impact, clearly any inflationary costs or price increases could have a negative impact on our customer loan performance given they [customers] live paycheck to paycheck.

• Our business serves institutional clients, and it is clear there is little incentive for most to make new investments in the face of the high level of uncertainty we currently face.
• Will try to amortize higher tenant improvement finish-out costs over the primary term of the lease in the form of a higher base rent charge.
• The current tariffs have had a profoundly negative impact on our business. Across the board, they’ve driven up costs, created unpredictability in supply chains and slowed down decision-making. As a result, we’ve had to put all capital improvement projects on indefinite hold and freeze new asset purchases. This isn’t just about pricing—it’s about confidence. Tariffs have made it difficult to plan, budget or invest with any degree of certainty. For a company like ours, which typically embraces growth, innovation and reinvestment, the ripple effect has been substantial. We’re feeling this not only in our day-to-day operations but also in our long-term strategy. The tariffs have effectively stalled our momentum and introduced unnecessary drag on what was otherwise a positive trajectory.
• We're exercising caution with any major capital expenditures, primarily from fear of the unknown

• The impact on my company will be my clients might have less money or face more uncertainty and as a result, will not buy, or will cancel, insurance.
• The clients we have with international exposure will suffer, thereby potentially lowering their revenues and insurance needs.

• Who doesn't understand that the reason manufacturing moved overseas is because Americans constantly expect and demand cheaper prices?
• It could have an impact on the building costs of homes.
• New-home builders may be impacted by materials used. If the cost increases, then the price of a new home will probably be increased.

• I can't budget or predict which or how policies will affect my industry or company. I feel the administration has done little to describe what the end game will be and has caused more uncertainly by not explaining honestly what we American businesses will be facing.

• The imposition of tariffs on green coffee, bags, cups and other supplies is certain to increase both input costs and sales prices. At this point, planning and forward-buying have forestalled these impacts; however, in my view, time is running short to resolve the uncertainty and reduce import tariffs to former or lower levels and avoid material negative impacts to both company profitability and the economy. That said, we remain optimistic that the situation will be resolved satisfactorily before these impacts are realized.

• [Our plan is to] buckle down, stop spending money and improvise to get through this next phase.

• Our plan to deal with the tariffs is really uncertain due to lack of information regarding vehicle pricing.

• Many of our customers work in ag or construction-related firms. ICE [Immigration and Customs Enforcement] is a huge concern for them, and tariffs will hit the spending of mid- and lower-income classes even if they don't realize it.
• Because we ship foodstuffs, our sales cycle is very short due to consumption and shelf life. Any change in input costs is generally passed along in a short time frame. This is true when costs go up or down. Because [President] Trump is hitting China with large tariffs, China has hit back on chicken that is exported to China (primarily dark meat). In the short run, this will probably shut down the export of chicken to China, so there will likely be a glut of chicken in the United States. I don't know if the "oversupply" will lower prices for retail markets, but on the wholesale side, I would expect dark-meat prices to fall. If the tariffs look to remain in place for the long term, U.S. poultry producers will adjust output to match consumption, thereby preserving the market pricing. I can't speak directly to the Australian beef market (we don't import, but I'm talking with companies that do import), but the U.S. buys a significant amount of high-quality beef from Australia. If high U.S. tariffs tamp down Australian beef imports, that will likely cause domestic U.S. beef prices to rise even higher. The U.S. also imports a significant amount of lower-quality beef from Latin America. I expect that to continue.