Let's say good morning to the chief executive officer of the Women Business Collaborative. It's Gwen Rece. Good morning, Gwen. So I'm sorry, it's Gwen.
Ye morning Amy when Yeah, no problem, good morning, Hell, I'm good.
We're talking to Brenda Reese a little bit later, so I just mixed you guys up. So, Gwen, before we get started and jump in and talk about these the tariffs, tell us a little bit about what your organization, Women Business Collaborative does. So we have a frame of reference.
Absolutely, So we are a collaborative, which means we have eighty seven organization, sixty seven sponsors, and three hundred individuals that are committed to growing women in business. And related to this conversation, about forty percent of our collaborative is women own businesses. So we are there to support and grow these businesses and help continue to grow the economy.
Okay, awesome, So let's talk about tariffs. A lot of focus has been on the car makers and things like lumber and steal. We just had a story about Ford sent on a memo to its dealership saying, hey, if the tariffs take hold, prices are going to go up. But as the tariffs take hold. If they do, they could have a huge effect on small businesses. So what kind of things are the small businesses experiencing?
Well, i'm the small businesses which are about either you know, forty four percent of economic activity and actually have small businesses and all businesses women are about forty percent. You know, what we're seeing is these are mass market goods, these are necessities, these are consumer goods, These are toys, these are clothing, apparel, makeup, and so forth. So it's a
really interesting, you know, group of businesses. And these are businesses and have smaller profit margins, right, which means that any disruption in their supplies if they put into their business or their outputs, you know, they just don't have that ability to weather a shock, right, So that means can they pass it on to the consumer? Do they
have to shutter? Do they have access to financing? And unlike those those bigger companies, they have less access to financing an opportunity, So they're really being impacted by you know, what may or may not happen in the shifts in what the tariffs are going to be.
And have they already started to feel the effects. Are we still sort of in a holding pattern since almost everything's been passed, well not China though, but pretty much everything else has been paused for ninety days. But those tariffs are still in place for China. So are people feeling the pinch already.
They are peeling the pinch already, and they're already starting to advocate, you know, describe what that what that effect looks like if you're a business that regards on a supply that you would, you know, bring from China. Clothing is one of the biggest things. Where the world's biggest importer of clothing, so they're starting to fill at effect. Prices are going up and I think it was last week we saw an article that said you can expect prices to raise by ten to twenty five percent right now,
and things like toys by about twenty three percent. So the impacts are immediate and it's impacting. Also, you know, local businesses are people that we're going to start a business because where are you going to get those supplies? Where are you going to find that financing?
Yeah, and then even if they can whether the storm, like you said, they've got a lot of decisions to make. I mean, like do they cut hours for their workers, Do they increase prices, do they offer fewer items. So there's a lot of decisions that are going to have to be made.
Absolutely, And part of it too is, you know, like I said earlier, you know, we get packaging things for packaging manufactured outside of the United States. So if you don't have somewhere to buy that, that changes your financials, It changes your you know, investment and money that you need. And women still access only two percent of all available capital. So you're making immediate decisions about what you can do and how you can operate.
Yeah, and so you mentioned women, and I know you work with a women business collaborative. What extra challenges do women owned businesses have?
Well, I think they say, you know, they say, sort of two extra challenges, right, myn owned businesses is one is they don't have the same networks and they are not represented in some of these larger industries at the same rate as men are, which means what they don't have the type of partnerships, they don't have access to capital and finance, and then definitely probably don't have that sort of advocacy power or that flexibility to figure out where to absorb those prices or how they can raise
the prices. Plus many are manufacturing you know, many of our consumer goods and the goods that we use every day, so you know, passing that price along to the consumer really is going to impact their business and what they're going to be able to sell. So they really do facing new challenges.
Okay, Gwenn, is there anything that we wake up call listeners can do to help out the small businesses?
Well, I think a couple of things. I mean we always say, you know, by local, you know, and that sort of thing, and try to do what we can do. But you know, the advocacy right now is let's get
some exemptions for those small businesses. Let's look at the impact on the small businesses, and let's find where big companies you know and local, national, and federal government can support those small business So if we can continue to make that drum week drumbeat call for that action and support those small businesses, that's what we can do to help them stay alive.
Local and small is always good. Gwen Young, the CEO of Women's Business Collaborative, thanks so much for helping kind of sort through this with us today. Go small business, Thank any goo.
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