WASHINGTON \u2014 The Canadian Kitchen Cabinet Association says while it welcomes U.S. President Donald Trump\u2019s postponement of tariff increases on furniture, cabinets and vanities, the industry is still being devastated by the duties.<\/p>\n
Trump hit the sector with 25 per cent tariffs in October but paused a promised increase to a total of 30 per cent for upholstered furniture and to 50 per cent for cabinets and vanities that was set to take effect Jan. 1.<\/p>\n
\u201cYes, 50 per cent is a relief. But our industry is still reeling from the 25 per cent,\u201d said Luke Elias, the association\u2019s vice-president.<\/p>\n
\u201cYou just can\u2019t mitigate that in the manufacturing environment overnight.\u201d<\/p>\n
Kitchen cabinet manufacturing is a $4.7-billion industry in Canada and Elias said the sector exports about $600 million worth of product annually. Trump\u2019s tariffs delivered another blow to an industry already dealing with a soft Canadian housing market, he added.<\/p>\n
Manitoba-based Elias Woodwork employs more than 400 people and exports about 80 per cent of its product to the United States. Company president Ralph Fehr said the 25 per cent tariffs are damaging but a 50 per cent duty would have been catastrophic. <\/p>\n
\u201cWho in the U.S. would want to pay that much extra for Canadian content?\u201d he said. \u201cI just don\u2019t think that would have worked out real well.\u201d<\/p>\n
Fehr said his company uses American materials \u2014 such as hardwood lumber from the Appalachians \u2014 and turns them into finished products it then sells to customers in the United States.<\/p>\n
Fehr said Ottawa espoused the virtues of exporting to the United States for decades and he\u2019s spent 45 years building a business based on that model. \u201cWe\u2019re kind of hoping they go to bat for us and try to come to some agreement.\u201d<\/p>\n
Fehr said the tariffs have taken all of the profit out of his business. For now, his company is looking to reduce costs and streamline to weather the storm.<\/p>\n
The industry has seen layoffs since Trump\u2019s tariffs were implemented in October, said Elias (who, despite his surname, is not connected to Elias Woodwork). Industry meetings in December saw multiple companies warn that job losses were on the horizon, he added.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt\u2019s very critical,\u201d he said. \u201cWe\u2019re in dire straits.\u201d<\/p>\n
Elias said that while Ottawa\u2019s Build Canada procurement policies have been helpful, he wants to see them extended to all taxpayer incentives for the building industry, including those at the provincial level.<\/p>\n
Elias said the federal government must also address the effect of parts imports coming in at below market value \u2014 a major irritant for the American cabinet and furniture industry.<\/p>\n
He said low-priced parts from Asia are being brought into Canada, assembled and sold in the United States under a \u201cmade-in-Canada\u201d label. The Canadian industry also has said these parts imports are undermining the domestic industry.<\/p>\n
In 2020, the U.S. Commerce Department imposed anti-dumping and countervailing duty orders on cabinets from China. The American Kitchen Cabinet Alliance has accused Canada and Mexico of acting as conduits to circumvent those measures.<\/p>\n
\u201cChina didn\u2019t leave the U.S. market. It just changed the return address,\u201d Luke Meisner, counsel for the American Kitchen Cabinet Alliance, said in his written testimony during a hearing on the Canada-U.S.-Mexico Agreement on trade last year.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe closed the front door for China. Canada and Mexico became the side doors.\u201d<\/p>\n
Trump has said the tariffs on furniture are needed to \u201cbolster American industry and protect national security.\u201d<\/p>\n
The trilateral trade agreement, widely known as CUSMA, is up for review this year and the American Kitchen Cabinet Alliance is looking to strengthen rules-of-origin requirements. Elias said American manufacturers are looking to build a \u201cFortress North America\u201d that would ensure cheap products aren\u2019t dumped in Canada or Mexico.<\/p>\n
CUSMA negotiations are likely to be tense and Trump already has claimed he\u2019s willing to walk away from the trade pact.<\/p>\n
Ottawa had been working to find an off-ramp to Trump\u2019s sectoral duties but any hope of near-term relief for Canada was dashed when Trump \u2014 angered by an Ontario-sponsored ad criticizing tariffs \u2014 called off trade talks in October.<\/p>\n
As the CUSMA review approaches, Elias said it\u2019s critical that the cabinet and furniture industry is not ignored in favour of higher-profile tariff targets like steel and automotives.<\/p>\n
He said there are 3,500 companies, employing more than 25,000 Canadians, being slammed by the duties.<\/p>\n
\u201cYou never hear about kitchen cabinets and we\u2019re in every home.\u201d<\/p>\n
This report by The Canadian Press was first published Jan. 2, 2026.<\/p>\n
Kelly Geraldine Malone, The Canadian Press<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"WASHINGTON \u2014 The Canadian Kitchen Cabinet Association says while it welcomes U.S. President Donald Trump\u2019s postponement of tariff…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":384244,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[11],"tags":[45,49,48,46],"class_list":{"0":"post-384243","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-economy","8":"tag-business","9":"tag-ca","10":"tag-canada","11":"tag-economy"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/384243","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=384243"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/384243\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/384244"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=384243"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=384243"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=384243"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}