Long Island grocers specializing in imported goods worry about prospect of tariffs

The last five years have brought the world to Long Islanders’ dinner plates. Grocery stores specializing in West African, Japanese, South Asian and Hispanic foods have opened across the region, joining stores that have served the area for decades.

But for many of these small businesses whose shelves are filled with imported rice, olive oil and tea, President Donald Trump’s tariffs have increased uncertainty. In recent days, the administration announced, then delayed double-digit “reciprocal” tariffs on dozens of countries and imposed a 10% baseline tariff on imports from most of the globe. China's goods will now be taxed at 145%.

Supermarket chains may navigate this new trade era by absorbing some of the tariff cost, warehousing products or shifting supply chains. But Long Island’s smaller independent markets may not have those options.

Prospect of price hikes

“I have to increase the price, and if I increase the price, I lose customers,” said George Miglis, who, with his wife, Chrystalla, has for 38 years run New Bakaliko on Broadway in Hicksville. “Instead of using me, they will go to the supermarket.”

Virtually every square inch of New Bakaliko is packed with products from Greece — wheels of cheese in the refrigerators, vats of olives on the floor, votive candles hanging from the ceiling.

While a supermarket might sell Greek olives, “The Greek product they have in there is just cream for them,” George Miglis said. “Somebody picks up some spaghetti and buys olives. For me, it’s not cream. ... All I have is Greek stuff.”

Trump and members of his administration have said tariffs will close trade deficits they describe as evidence of “cheating” by other countries, and that tariffs will encourage domestic production, producing more jobs and higher wages.

But Miglis said he worried he would be pushed out of business. Even before the tariff announcements, New Bakaliko faced challenges. Pandemic-era inflation hurt business and Miglis said he was still paying off a $300,000 loan he’d used to keep the business afloat. Also, he said, the Italians, Germans and Greeks who once lived around the store have been replaced by Chinese, Pakistanis and Indians, and “they all have their own supermarkets.”

Late last week, after global markets rebounded on news of the tariff delay, Miglis said his own market — usually busy this time of year with customers shopping for Passover and Easter — was still quiet.

“It seems like people can’t afford to shop,” he said.

Tariffs spell 'disaster' 

According to the Yale Budget Lab, a non-partisan policy research center, the tariffs in place now will raise food prices 2.9% over the long run, with fresh produce prices set to increase 5.4% before stabilizing at 3.7% higher. With no shift in the import shares of different countries, the tariffs will result in the equivalent of a loss of purchasing power of $4,400 per household on average in 2024 dollars. As consumers and businesses shift purchases in response to the tariffs, the price increase will settle to 1.6%, for a $2,600 loss per household.

Interviewed before the delay announcement, Phil Lempert, a retail and grocery analyst known as the Supermarket Guru, said the tariffs would be “a disaster for the food world,” pushing up retail prices on 40% to 50% of the 40,000 items sold in a traditional supermarket. He predicted price-constrained Americans would bear the brunt of the tax’s impact.

“People will be changing eating habits,” he said. “In the case of produce — we know produce is a good healthy staple for us — there are going to be people who are not able to afford it.”

The Trump administration has said tariffs will incentivize Americans to buy American products, but Lempert said that was likely impossible for some fruits and vegetables. Avocado and berry production has moved to Mexico, partly because of climate change, fires and floods in California, he said. Even if farmers were to embark on a growing spree tomorrow, it would take four to seven years for an avocado tree to bloom. An apple tree could take even longer to bear fruit. Some produce, like tomatoes, could grow year-round in American greenhouses, but large-scale production requires significant capital investment, Lempert said.

In an email after the delay announcement, Lempert was not much more sanguine.

“Even a 10% additional price on top of the food inflation of the past couple of years is hard for many families,” he wrote, adding about $1,000 a year to a typical American family’s grocery bill.

Also, high tariffs on China will impact American consumers, he said. The United States imported $6.8 billion in agricultural products from China last year, according to the USDA. China is an important source of the frozen vegetables used in processed frozen foods, and the source of 90% of the world’s garlic crop, Lempert said.

Even tariffs on China’s non-agricultural products could impact shoppers, Lempert wrote in his email. “As stores need to remodel (or build new ones) a lot of the technology comes from China.”

Several owners or managers of Long Island stores with extensive selections of Chinese products declined to comment.

Strength of specialty stores

Not all small grocery owners felt as pinched as the Miglises. Ysa Weller, who with her daughter Kate Gladyshev runs Asian One Best Grocery on Portion Road in Ronkonkoma, said Thursday the 10% tariff “can be sustained. Thank God, it’s just 10%.”

Asian One operates a small restaurant and sells staples found in any well-stocked Filipino kitchen, with aisles of rice, shrimp paste, soy sauce and the vinegar used for chicken and pork adobo. About 90% of the store’s products originate in the Philippines.

Weller and Gladyshev said their relatively small size and the narrow profit margins in the grocery business left them little maneuvering room. But specializing can also be a strength. Even if tariffs force the store to raise prices it is unlikely that someone with a craving for shrimp or fish chips will find a supermarket that matches Asian One’s selection. And the store still sells as much rice as it ever did, though the price has gone up over time. 

That may be because, for some customers, rice is not a commodity: “They want whatever makes them comfortable,” including the rice brand they grew up with, and they can taste the difference, Weller said.

Ning Wang, who, with his brother Lawrence runs Hanamaru Japanese Mart on Jericho Turnpike in Syosset, along with businesses that sell rice wine and home goods, said modest cost increases could happen within a week for air-shipped produce like Japanese melon and strawberries, and in three to four weeks for container-shipped products.

Wang said he was reluctant to shift from some Japanese products like terroir-dependent rice, whose flavor and texture are shaped by “weather, water, environment. … These Japanese farms, it’s usually a couple generations that their family has been growing rice.”

Alisan Ercan also finds himself in a tough position. He runs Turkish Pistachio on Route 112 in Medford, selling dried fruits and nuts from barrels in the middle of the store’s single room, kefirs and Turkish seltzers from the fridge in back, cherry stems for tea from little bags near the cash register. His clientele has grown beyond Long Island's Turkish immigrant community and business was good during an afternoon visit last week.

On the topic of tariffs, Ercan was agnostic: “Maybe it’s the right way, maybe it’s the wrong way. Maybe for the country they have to do this. We don’t criticize.”

But on Thursday he said an unpredictable economic outlook was making it hard for him to invest with confidence, echoing a sentiment voiced this spring by CEOs of billion-dollar corporations.

“I don’t see the future very well for my business,” Ercan said. “If I put money for my business — build better, or bigger, or more locations — who guarantees products don’t become more expensive?” Ercan said he told himself: “Ali, just wait.”