Edmonton businesses wait to see potential fallout from looming U.S. tariffs on Canadian goods

Jeremy Thompson looks at how Edmontonians plan to buy local if the U.S. tariffs proceed.

Edmonton-based businesses are in wait-and-see mode when it comes to a looming Canadian trade war with the United States.

While U.S. President Donald Trump said Tuesday the application of 25-per-cent tariffs on Canadian goods coming to his country – and retaliatory ones in response from Canada – are on pause for 30 days after threatening to impose them starting Tuesday, businesses in Alberta’s capital city say questions about what may happen are up “in the air.”

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David Owens, owner of Sherbrooke Liquor, said his business is all for “buying Canada first” but also supports customer choice. And given that his business is responsible for all of the product in the northwest Edmonton store, “it’s a little bit tough to pull it right now.”

“We’re a unique market compared to some of the other provinces,” Owens told CTV News Edmonton on Monday.

“(Stores in other provinces) can choose to pull things off the shelf because it’s government dollars that have paid for it. Here (in Alberta), I’ve paid for everything in this store. It’s tough to pull tens of thousands of dollars worth of product off the shelves right now. You may choose to come in here and not buy it – totally your choice, and I stand by you if you wanted to make that choice.”

For local chopstick maker Anson Wong, who exports 70 per cent of what he designs and makes to the U.S., said “luckily” his product doesn’t come from something like “a million-dollar oil rig,” so an extra $5 on a $20 pair of chopsticks won’t make his customers “too worried.”

“But maybe they are, I don’t know,” he told CTV News Edmonton.

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Wong said he would welcome forms of federal help in case U.S. tariffs become reality to help keep as many of his States-side customers as possible - “to give them a discount in some way, or maybe free shipping,” he said – but would worry such handouts would lead to more inflation.

“I think a subsidy like that would definitely help the ones who (it would help) the most, but if everybody who doesn’t need it takes it, then it will probably affect the inflation rate as well.”

Owens said the most important thing Edmonton shoppers can do is research local businesses to support.

“This is your choice. You can choose to support Canada,” he said. “You can choose to support local small business owners like myself or there’s umteen other ones in here in town. Go help them out.

“That’s your best choice right now ... You can (also) choose not to spend money with on certain products.

With files from CTV News Edmonton’s Jeremy Thompson