We are contemplating how to address tariffs and would like to know how others are approaching these huge increases in costs.
We recently had a vendor say they are not adjusting prices but having a line item at checkout for an additional 10%. This is one option that we are considering at checkout but unsure how to implement it into our checkout for both our POS stores and our ecommerce site.
Another option is including the Trump tariffs in the price, but then I worry about our prices appearing to be higher than those who take a different approach.
I’d love to hear how others are addressing this tricky situation.
This is a tricky balance between being transparent with customers and staying competitive. Some stores add a separate tariff fee at checkout, while others roll it into product prices to keep things simple. If you’re on Shopify Plus, you can automate the extra charge with Checkout Scripts, but for POS, you’d need to add it manually or use an app. A middle-ground option is applying the fee only to certain products. Whatever you decide, a quick note at checkout or in an FAQ can help customers understand the change. Let me know if you need help setting it up!
This is a tough situation, and there’s no one-size-fits-all answer.
I think some business, like ur vendor, add a separate “Tariff Surcharge” at checkout. Shopify doesnt allow automatic fees in checkout unless you’re on Shopify Plus. But you can add a cart-level “Handling Fee” or use an app like Order & Product Fees
One typical method is to keep prices consistent and use a regulated “tariff adjustment” as a shipping or handling fee, rather than a line item at checkout, since that is consistent across POS and online. On Shopify, many retailers do this through modifications to the shipping rate or by way of a custom product/fee that is automatically added in the cart using Shopify functions or a simple app to have the same effect in POS and e-commerce. Others fully pass through into pricing so there is no perception gap, but that requires margin modeling. Typically, a hybrid approach is the most flexible when prices are changing rapidly.
Hi @silasstarr, the others have covered the mechanical options well (separate line item vs rolling into price vs hybrid). I want to add an angle that is relevant specifically to the competitive side of this.
The pricing transparency question is now also a customer acquisition question.
When a shopper asks ChatGPT or Perplexity “where can I buy [your product category] with clear pricing and no surprise fees,” AI tools are beginning to factor in review sentiment and on-site transparency signals when deciding which stores to recommend. Stores that have visible, honest cost explanations on their site tend to get cited more positively than stores where pricing confusion shows up in reviews.
That is worth thinking about for how you frame whatever approach you choose. If you go the separate tariff line item route, a one-paragraph explainer on your pricing or FAQ page that says plainly “we have added a temporary tariff surcharge of X% to affected products while costs are elevated” does two things: it reduces cart abandonment from shoppers who see an unexpected charge, and it puts factual, positive content about your pricing practices on your site that AI tools can reference.
On the Shopify implementation side: if you are not on Plus, the cleanest approach without custom code is using a cart-level “fee” product that gets added automatically via an app (Order and Product Fees is the most commonly used for this). It shows up in the cart before checkout which is important for POS consistency. The vendor’s separate line item approach is the same idea at a different layer.
Whatever you choose, the customer communication matters as much as the technical implementation right now.