Price Gougers Are Exploiting Trumpâs Tariffs âPrice optimizationâ consultants are helping clients capitalize on Trumpâs chaotic tariff rollout by using surveillance pricing tools, while Republican FTC chair Andrew Ferguson is reversing efforts to keep them in check.
The day after President Donald Trump announced his sweeping âLiberation Dayâ tariffs, pricing guru Craig Zawada held an urgent summit for his clients. The global economy was roiling with anxiety and stocks were in a tailspin, but Zawada had a more hopeful message to impart: for the businesses deploying his companyâs âsmart pricingâ software, this was a rare opportunity.
âThere is perhaps more of a window to make changes to your pricing than there has been before,â Zawada said. Consumers, he explained, were bracing themselves for tariff sticker shock: âCustomers expect change.â
âNow,â he said, âis the time to take advantage.â
Zawada works for PROS Holdings, a company that provides software services helping companies price their products, tailored in particular to airlines. Heâs part of a cottage industry of âpricing optimizationâ consultants who, using lessons learned from pandemic price increases, are advising companies across industries on how to hike prices in response to tariffs or even just the threat of tariffs â and then keep them high.
Republican Federal Trade Commission (FTC) chair Andrew Ferguson, the nationâs top antitrust cop, has been warning companies that enforcers are prepared to take action against tariff profiteering. Yet he has effectively given the consultant class a âgreen light,â as one former FTC official told the Lever, by rolling back an inquiry scrutinizing their practices.
Last year, under the Biden administration, PROS and several other pricing companies were served orders to hand over documents to the FTC as part of an inquiry into such industrywide âsurveillance pricingâ practices, putting them on notice of a potential crackdown.
But one of the first actions taken by Ferguson when he took the helm of the agency in January was to turn off public comments for the staff report produced from documents the agency gathered, thereby shutting down the inquiry entirely. That came just weeks after a handful of large companies subject to the inquiry contributed millions to President Donald Trumpâs inauguration fund.
Previously as a commissioner, Ferguson had voted against releasing that staff report despite originally authorizing the study examining the pricing practices. (...)
Yes: a failure to comprehend the simplest economic principle. It's far easier to blame the people who raise the price than the people who caused the prices to rise.
Eggs are in short supply. Prices rise until people decide to either pay up or have something else for breakfast.
Prices rising in scarcity forces people to prioritize. The people who eggs are worth the most to pay for them, if they aren't worth it to you you skip it. It's a feature, not a bug.
Eggs are in short supply. Prices rise until people decide to either pay up or have something else for breakfast.
Prices rising in scarcity forces people to prioritize. The people who eggs are worth the most to pay for them, if they aren't worth it to you you skip it. It's a feature, not a bug.
Covid showed us why protecting the global supply chain was so important, and how disrupting that would lead to significant inflation (or worse).
Now, we have a president blowing up supply chains with unnecessary, self induced uncertainty.
The family of the founder announced a secondary offering yesterday. Instead of the avian flu destroying their business, it appears to have created an opportunity to at least partially exit at what the founders family feels is a high point.
to be clearer...revenue goes up from volume and price.
Volume was up 10%, and if prices were stable that would result in a similar sales increase...so prices clearly benefitted the producer.
If there costs had gone up in a similar fashion, the margin would have been more stable.
But...wholesale egg prices are usually contractual based on market prices for the commodity, not necessarily the price the producer itself sets for its product. Different than say an apparel manufacturer that mostly sets its own price (although commodities/markets also have an impact in terms of fabric costs).
I imagine though producers could have built in some type of discount for its retail customers. (i have no idea what type of margin impact the retailers got, up or down).
Yes, that's why I mentioned the first option. Maybe they were just horribly inefficient. they wasted 30% of the eggs instead of selling them. Maybe Jim on the line was a Klutz, it is a fragile product...
There are ways that the numbers could make sense without them being opportunistic assholes. They are unlikely ways, so it's far more likely they are just opportunistic assholes.
Most likely is that they just saw an opportunity and thought 'why not' as they jacked their prices.
The family of the founder announced a secondary offering yesterday. Instead of the avian flu destroying their business, it appears to have created an opportunity to at least partially exit at what the founders family feels is a high point.
Most likely is that they just saw an opportunity and thought 'why not' as they jacked their prices.
to be clearer...revenue goes up from volume and price.
Volume was up 10%, and if prices were stable that would result in a similar sales increase...so prices clearly benefitted the producer.
If there costs had gone up in a similar fashion, the margin would have been more stable.
But...wholesale egg prices are usually contractual based on market prices for the commodity, not necessarily the price the producer itself sets for its product. Different than say an apparel manufacturer that mostly sets its own price (although commodities/markets also have an impact in terms of fabric costs).
I imagine though producers could have built in some type of discount for its retail customers. (i have no idea what type of margin impact the retailers got, up or down).
all due respect, when your profit margin jumps from 23% to 45% on a 10% volume increase, that's because you either raised prices or completely eliminated any historical promotions.
probably a combination
Most likely is that they just saw an opportunity and thought 'why not' as they jacked their prices.
There are non-profiteering ways this can happen. Maybe they had little impact on production and they are traditionally higher priced and less efficient. The lack of competition would take up the slack and improve their efficiency, then PROFIT!
Or they just jacked their prices because they could and sold every egg they could squeeze out of he hens.
all due respect, when your profit margin jumps from 23% to 45% on a 10% volume increase, that's because you either raised prices or completely eliminated any historical promotions.
Que?
For its 3Q ended 3/1/25, the largest egg producer saw volumes jump over 10%, sales more than double and operating profits quadrupled...all while the headline was egg prices are higher because of a shortage. Now I could see perhaps they werent as impacted and sales benefitted as they picked up the slack. But....at the same time their profit margin doubled to 45%.
There are non-profiteering ways this can happen. Maybe they had little impact on production and they are traditionally higher priced and less efficient. The lack of competition would take up the slack and improve their efficiency, then PROFIT!
Or they just jacked their prices because they could and sold every egg they could squeeze out of he hens.
It's springtime, so my hens are super productive. Also my local Costco (which normally sells eggs by the pallet load in flats) has none. Zero. Zip. Not any.
Statistically these are known as anecdotes.
Que?
For its 3Q ended 3/1/25, the largest egg producer saw volumes jump over 10%, sales more than double and operating profits quadrupled...all while the headline was egg prices are higher because of a shortage. Now I could see perhaps they werent as impacted and sales benefitted as they picked up the slack. But....at the same time their profit margin doubled to 45%.
It's springtime, so my hens are super productive. Also my local Costco (which normally sells eggs by the pallet load in flats) has none. Zero. Zip. Not any.
Statistically these are known as anecdotes.
Statistically, what was described is profiteering.. It's anecdotal if based on personal experience or limited data.
The nationâs largest egg producer, Cal-Maine Foods, reported that its profits for the first quarter of 2025 soared to $508 millionâmore than triple the $146 million it earned in the same period last year.
That's not an anecdote, it's public company financial disclosure.
A not so surprising fact about the so-called egg shortage, Cal Maine, the largest egg producer, not only saw its volume grow, but also its operating profits, up 4x for the quarter and nearly 7x YTD.
It's springtime, so my hens are super productive. Also my local Costco (which normally sells eggs by the pallet load in flats) has none. Zero. Zip. Not any.
A not so surprising fact about the so-called egg shortage, Cal Maine, the largest egg producer, not only saw its volume grow, but also its operating profits, up 4x for the quarter and nearly 7x YTD.
The Trump administration has raised taxes on Chinese imports to 125% as the trade war continues to heat up. The key facts and figures behind the presidentâs tariffs.
$3.2 billion: Market gains for bug-out bags
29: Turnips to be substituted into average Americanâs weekly diet
1 in 3: Americans currently screaming âSELL! SELL!â into cell phone
9: Quantity of eggs 401(k) worth now
1, 2, 3, 4: Numbers chanted by Trump before saying, âI declare a trade war!â
5: Days until you have to start making own soap
80%: Increase in Oliver Twist adaptations set in present day
48: Hours Youngstown, OH has been given to get a thriving banana industry up and running
Rentiers vs. manufacturers A new whoâs who of the global elites They dominate the countries that account for more than half of global GDP â but who are they? *
I'm sure our new AG, who recently said âI wish we could have him for 20 years as our president, but I think heâs gonna be finished probably after this term.â... is gonna look into that immediately.
