A car company boss says a new import tariff of 25% on cars and car parts coming into the US would be a “significant shift” for the business.
Morgan Motor Company in Malvern exports around 200 sports cars to the US every year, which makes up around a third of its overall revenue.
US President Donald Trump announced on Wednesday that the new tariff would come into effect on 2 April.
Managing director Matthew Hole said the move would have an impact on the company. “It’s a big chunk of our business; we make a £55m turnover a year so, although it’s too early to estimate, we can say it will cost a lot of money,” he said.
“At the moment, we have two [Morgan] models that we sell to the USA, the Plus Four and the Super 3, and that is about a third of vehicle turnover specifically, which is £48m annually.”
Despite the blow, Mr Hole said the 115-year-old company, which employs around 200 people to make the cars that sell for around £80k each, had been preparing for the “tariff war”.
“Because it’s such a significant shift of our business, we have been working on plans for this over the last month or so, since this tariff war news has been escalating.
“We’ve been making sure that we have some kind of a contingency plan in place, which limits the affect on our customers and limits the damage to ourselves,” he said.
A company spokesperson added: “A rough cost for a Plus Four in the US is $100k. Customers will see an increase on this, but we are working to ensure that it isn’t a direct 25% increase.”
President Trump said the tariff would lead to “tremendous growth” for the US car industry and promised it would spur jobs and investment.
A number of countries have expressed anger at the move. Canada called it a “direct attack”, while China accused the government of violating international trade rules.