Tariffs are rewriting peak season 2026: what it means for your inventory strategy

If you’re still planning inventory around “peak season starts in September,” you’re already a few months behind.

Retailers spent this summer racing tariffs, not demand. New Section 301 tariffs, ranging from 10% to 12.5%, took effect July 24, 2026, right after a temporary 10% global tariff under Section 122 expired. Businesses that saw the deadline coming brought their goods in early. U.S. ports handled 2.24 million twenty-foot equivalent units in May, the busiest month of the year, ahead of the traditional peak. June still ran 13.2% higher than a year earlier. The National Retail Federation’s Vice President of Supply Chain and Customs Policy, Jonathan Gold, put it plainly: “We had an early peak season this year.”

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Watch: tariff refunds and what they mean for your inventory strategy

We sat down with the National Retail Federation's Jonathan Gold to unpack how tariff refunds and the shifting trade policy timeline are reshaping import planning for 2026.

Watch on demand

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That’s not a one-off. It’s a pattern. Tariff deadlines are becoming their own kind of seasonal event, and they don’t run on the same clock as Black Friday.

What actually changed with tariffs this year

Here’s the sequence: a temporary 10% global tariff under Section 122 expired July 23, 2026. New Section 301 tariffs, 10% to 12.5%, took effect the next day on imports from 60 economies, following investigations into forced-labor enforcement. Any retailer with goods still in transit when that switch flipped paid more for the exact same shipment.

So retailers did the obvious thing: they moved inventory before the deadline instead of after it. That’s not a workaround. It’s the correct move if the alternative is paying a new tariff on stock you already committed to buying.

Why front-loading isn’t free

Bringing goods in early reduces what you owe in duties. It does not reduce what you owe in rent, cash flow, or forecasting risk.

Every pallet you bring in three months early is a pallet you’re paying to store for three extra months, based on a sales forecast made three months further from the actual selling season. If demand shifts, or a product doesn’t move the way you expected, you’re holding markdown risk on top of the storage bill. The European Central Bank has flagged exactly this trade-off: businesses respond to tariffs by building inventory ahead of the deadline, shifting sourcing to lower-tariff markets, or adjusting prices. All three cost something. None of them are free.

For a seller without flexible storage space, front-loading means one of two bad options: renting more space than you need for months you don’t need it, or turning down the early-import play and eating the tariff instead.

Building a peak season plan that isn’t hostage to trade policy

The sellers handling this well aren’t the ones with the best tariff forecast. They’re the ones who can flex their storage footprint up when they need to front-load and back down when they don’t, without signing a five-year lease to do it.

That’s the piece a fixed warehouse lease can’t give you. You commit to a footprint based on today’s guess about tomorrow’s trade policy, and you’re locked in either way. A flexible space model lets you scale up for three months of front-loaded inventory and scale back down once it sells through, so the tariff decision doesn’t force a real estate decision.

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Space that scales up when you need it, and back down when you don't

Saltbox members bring in extra inventory ahead of a known deadline, hold it in flexible storage, then release the space once it sells through. No five-year lease. No idle square footage.

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I’ve watched members here at Saltbox make exactly this move: bring in extra stock ahead of a known deadline, hold it in flexible storage for that moment, then release the space once it’s sold through. No new lease. No idle square footage sitting on the books for the rest of the year.

Trade policy isn’t going to get more predictable. Geopolitical disruption, customs changes, and freight bottlenecks are all live variables now, on top of tariffs. The peak season calendar is event-driven, and the events keep coming. Building a fulfillment setup that can flex with them, instead of one that assumes next year looks like last year, is the actual hedge.

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More peak season prep, all in one place

Tariffs are just one variable in play this year. For carrier deadlines, staffing tips, and everything else on your peak season checklist, visit the Saltbox Holiday Hub.

Explore the Holiday Hub