• Temu and Shein will be getting more expensive come 25th April 2025.
• The companies are blaming increases to their operating expenses thanks to sweeping export tariffs from the US.
• Other international companies will likely be increasing their prices in the coming months, including for South Africans.

In seemingly matching letters to customers this week, affordability-focused ecommerce giants Shein and Temu announced that they would hike their prices starting 25th April due to economic pressures from sweeping export tariffs issued by the United States.

Explaining why the increased prices are happening, the companies said that it was due to operating costs increasing.

“Due to recent changes in global trade rules and tariffs, our operating expenses have gone up. To keep offering the products you love without compromising on quality, we will be making price adjustments starting April 25, 2025,” thee statements read, according to Reuters.

Unfortunately for both Shein and Temu, which are popular for customers looking to import small, cheap orders at a time, countries like the United States and South Africa have made changes to “de minimis” exemptions further hampering their ability to maintain low prices.

In South Africa, any foreign ecommerce company has a 20 percent extra VAT added to all orders, no matter how little was paid for them. This VAT is increased to 45 percent for companies that sell clothes, like Shein.

These taxes significantly hampered Shein’s local growth according to recently released data that shows Shein’s local market share has declined significantly since launching in 2023. They were imposed by the government to give local firms a more competitive advantage over Shein and Temu’s ultra-low costs.

While local arms of the companies have yet to warn South Africans of price increases, it is likely they will be enacted, just like Sony is looking to do with PlayStation consoles being sold locally, and local subscriptions of PS Plus, costs for both of which are getting hiked.

It is likely that any large company that operates internationally will have their operations affected by the tariffs, which are now at a blanket 10 percent for most countries in the world, with China and Russia being the only exceptions – China having an over 100 percent export tariff and Russia having no tariffs at all with the official response being that sanctions already imposed on the country preclude any meaningful trade anyway.

The 10 percent tariffs will only last for the next three months when they will return to higher amounts unless President Donald Trump changes his mind, which he is prone to do in increasingly confusing ways.

This means that these same companies will have to increase their prices in their many regions, like South Africa.