By Anne d’Anocerzio and Didi Tang
New York (AP) – The Price Crusade of President Donald Trump has targeted a number of foreign products, European wines and Mexico automobile parts with films made abroad. Recently, the wandering of the president found another child of the rhetorical poster: toy dolls.
Trump said that children would be able to have two dolls – perhaps three or five – instead of 30 if American import taxes increase consumer prices. The answer on social networks included memes of him described like the Grinch and the photos of the Mercedes convertible the size of a young Barron Trump.
“Completely disconnected”, the CEO of loyal subjects Jonathan Cathey, whose toy to collect toy in Los Angeles produces strawberry dolls from Strawberry and Rainbow Brite, wrote on LinkedIn. “If this moment is not a moment of cake” let them eat “through the echoes of history? Like how toys and dolls have become the metaphor of the martyr of this inconsistency of absurd trade war.”
The president’s comments also touched a nerve with the parents, both who were offended in the relaxed way in which he hypothesized that “two dolls may cost a few more dollars” and those who recognized that their own children have more toys than they need.
Be that as it may, the American toys industry has a lot of conduct on a possible de -escalation of the tariff deadlock between the Trump administration and the government in Beijing. Almost 80% of toys sold in the United States come from China.
The Toy Association, a commercial group, put pressure for an immediate suspended from the 145% rate rate that the president put on Chinese manufacturing products. Some toy companies have the probability that vacation shortages are increasing every week that the rate remains in force.
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President Donald Trump listens to a meeting from the Cabinet to the White House on Wednesday, April 30, 2025, in Washington. (AP photo / Evan VUCCI)
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President Donald Trump listens to a meeting from the Cabinet to the White House on Wednesday, April 30, 2025, in Washington. (AP photo / Evan VUCCI)
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Here is a snapshot of the debate on the doll and the impact of tariffs on toys:
How much is the market for American dolls worth?
From Barbie, Bratz and Cabbage Patch Kids to Adora Baby Dolls, American Girl and our generation, dolls are a big company in the United States as well as beloved toys.
The doll category, which includes accessories such as clothing, generated American sales of $ 2.7 billion last year, compared to $ 2.9 billion in 2023 and $ 3.4 billion in 2019, according to the market firm Circana.
Consumers made follies on toys at the height of the pandemic covids to keep the children and themselves busy, but sales appeared as inflation seized the economy.
Young girls are more interested in buying makeup and skin care also cooled the demand for dolls, said Marshal Cohen, chief retail advisor of Circana.
What do toy companies do to navigate prices?
The largest toy manufacturer in the country, Mattel, said this week that it should increase the prices of certain products sold in the United States to compensate for higher costs related to prices.
The company, whose brands include Barbie and American Girl, said that the increases were necessary even if it accelerates the expansion of its manufacturing base outside of China.
Small toy companies should have more harm than Mattel and Hasbro, which makes the baby food, drinking and flooding layers alive. Cathey said he had interrupted the expeditions of loyal subjects from China in April because he could not pay the stratospheric rate they would have incurred.
“No one is as an island with so much money,” he said.
With about four months of inventory in hand, Cathey said that his ability to guarantee the stock of vacation depends on a break in the confrontation of American-Chinese exchanges in the next two weeks, because it would take time for freight operations to resume.
Cepia, a Missouri company that was behind the 2009 holiday season, hit Zhu Zhu Pets, launched a 11 -inch fashion doll line called Decora Girlz last year. CEO James Russell Hornsby said he was working to move a certain production, but this decision will not occur in time to replace the orders he planned to obtain from China.
Hornsby described himself as a supporter of Trump and said that he understood the desire for the administration to reduce commercial imbalances.
“Let’s just make the offers and stop it all because (Trump) disrupts Christmas,” he said.
What is happening in the manufacture of a doll?
Although American Girl launched in 1986 with a line based on fictitious historical figures, dolls have never been domestic products. They were made in Germany before production was ultimately moved to China.
Toys experts say that in addition to lower costs, Chinese factories have developed techniques and expertise that are not easily reproduced.
“We have no capacity in the United States to do rooted doll hair. And then you have things like faces. Some of them are painted by hand, others have finished with a tampo machine (printing),” said James Zahn, editor of industry publication, toy book, about the creation of dolls.
Hornsby said that the rooting of synthetic hair on the heads of Decora Girlz Dolls is carried out by skilled workers in Guangzhou and Dongguan factories in China.
“It’s not just about staying in a machine and it does it automatically,” he said. “You should know what you are doing to make this doll looks like a full whole hair while maybe literally 60% of the head is filled with hair.”
Are toys from China sure?
The deputy chief of staff of the White House, Stephen Miller, said last week that he assumed that consumers would prefer to pay more for American manufacturing products. Dolls made in China may have led painting there, he said.
Teresa Murray, Consumer Supervisor Director of the US Public Interest Research Group, said the table was more complicated.
Products for children aged 12 and under require tests and third -party certification of laboratories approved by the American Consumer Product Safety Commission, the agency responsible for applying lead levels in toys, Murray said.
The rules apply to all products sold in American toys by major brands such as Fisher-Price, Mattel, Hasbro and Lego, which have long been outsourced in China, are generally in compliance, she said.
But the rise in online purchases, including electronic commercial platforms that send American consumers directly abroad, has posed a challenge, according to Murray. When evaluated at less than $ 800, these plots entered the franchise of American rights and were not subject to the same control as bulk imports, she said.
The White House eliminated customs exemption from May 2 for low value parcels from mainland China and Hong Kong. Customs and the protection of American border expects additional surveillance will facilitate the reporting of problems.
Toy companies and industry experts argue that high prices on Chinese imports will try buyers sensitive to prices to search for cheap counterfeit toys that include higher security risks.
Can children have too many dolls?
Many people agree that American consumption culture has become uncontrollable, largely due to the remaining prices thanks to the work of foreign factory workers who earn much less than in the United States
Katie Walley-Wiegert, 38, senior marketing in Richmond, Virginia, and the parent of a 2-year-old son, agrees that there is too much materialism, but thinks that parents should have choices to decide what is best for their children. She found that the comments of the rich Trump had repressed.
“I think it’s a small view of purchasing habits and realities for people who buy toys for children,” said Walley-Wiegert.
Elenor Mak, a resident of San Francisco, who founded the Jilly Bing Doll Company after being able to find an American Asian doll for her daughter, Jillian, now 5 years old, said that the president’s remarks had upset her because some families have trouble buying a single doll.
The trade war with China “makes it even more impossible for these families,” said Mak.
Originally published:
California Daily Newspapers
