SMOOSH JUICE
Tariff Updates: CMON Buckles Down, Boardlandia Closes, Publishers Halt Shipments, and More | BoardGameGeek News
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I have far too many tabs open with tariff-related posts from publishers, from creators, and on news sites, so I’ll be as succinct as possible and encourage you to explore them as you wish:
āŖļø On April 24, CMON posted “An Update on Our Internal Teams and Company Focus“:
Unfortunately, this involves extremely difficult staffing decisions, affecting all of our creative teams with reductions. We did not make this choice lightly, and our thoughts are with everyone impacted. We are incredibly grateful for their roles in our success over the years, and these talented people will be missed both professionally and personally.
The industry continues to rapidly evolve, and unpredictable situations like the recent tariffs, or COVID just a few years ago, present challenges for everyone in board games. With that said, it is our responsibility to take these difficult measures to ensure that we can keep current projects on track and deliver them in a timely manner. We will of course resume new development as soon as possible.
Please rest assured that these decisions will help ensure that we keep our commitments to our backers, partners, and community.
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āŖļø In “We Are Suing the President“, Jamey Stegmaier of Stonemaier Games mentions a lawsuit his company has joined as a result of its “upcoming tariff payments of nearly $1.5 million” for reprints and Vantage, then he details release plans for these products.
āŖļø Online retailer Boardlandia has closed, noting that “[o]ver the past few years, our business has faced a series of significant and increasing challenges. We have poured our personal savings, our time, and countless hours of hard work into Boardlandia, striving to overcome these obstacles. The recent tariffs have unfortunately added an unsustainable burden to these existing pressures, leaving us with no viable path forward.”
āŖļø Level 99 Games will release the crowdfunded Spooktacular from company owner D. Brad Talton, Jr. everywhere but the United States, with those copies being on hold until further notice.
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āŖļø AEG is doing the same for John D. Clair‘s Dead Reckoning: Port of Call (link) and Mike Elliott‘s latest expansions for Thunderstone Quest: Twilight Souls and The All-Consuming Hive (link).
In addition, AEG completed a crowdfunding campaign for Phil Walker-Harding‘s Misfit Heroes on April 4, 2025 ā oooh, bad timing! ā but that game isn’t due to ship until March 2026, so who knows what the situation might be then? If anyone is working on a tariff-evading, teleportation-based game delivery system (made in the USA, mind you!), then you can help folks get their misfits in time.
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āŖļø Zoo Tycoon: The Board Game ā New Shores from Marc DĆ¼r, Samuel Luterbacher, and Treecer is yet another crowdfunding project that is being fulfilled everywhere but the U.S.
In this new Bizarro world, everyone in the United States will look to Asutralia in envy because they’re all playing the new games and we can only sit and wait.
āŖļø “I cannot believe I am writing this.” That’s how A.J. Porfirio of Van Ryder Games starts “A Letter from the President“, which might make you think for a second that President Trump is writing to fans of Final Girl, but that’s not the case. Instead Porfirio mentions temporary price increases on the Final Girl line since that line is the one that needs reprinting most often and “the tariffs will decimate all the reserves we have built”.
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āŖļø Van Ryder Games also conducted a “pre-sale” of two thousand copies of Final Girl: Bad Times at Buddyland, the first Feature Film from Final Girl Season 4, solely to U.S. residents “because this preorder will be shipped direct to you from China before the i]de minimis[/i exemption expires on May 2nd”.
Under the current de minimis exemption, U.S. residents can receive packages of goods worth up to US$800 shipped to them from outside the country without paying tariffs or import fees, but as of May 2, 2025, NPR reports that “[t]hese lower-value shipments will now face a tariff of 30% of the ‘value of the postal item containing goods for merchandise’ with a minimum fee that will eventually rise to $50” ā but only for packages coming from China and Hong Kong.
Supposedly this new tariff policy is meant to address “the Synthetic Opioid Supply Chain in the People’s Republic of China”, but since nothing in the April 2, 2025 executive order from President Trump addresses increased inspection of packages, I’m not sure how that “supply chain” would change other than drugs getting more expensive.
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āŖļø On April 15, Cephalofair Games COO Price Johnson appeared on CNN to talk about the impact of tariffs on their business ā with the impact being that the company has to search for new markets outside the United States given that it has US$1.2 million in product ready to ship, but doesn’t fancy paying more than US$1.7 million in tariff costs. (Facebook link)
āŖļø In addition to cancelling some releases, delaying others, and storing half of its print runs in Canada or China, Hachette Boardgames USA is offering retailers large discounts on product in stock in order to raise funds to pay tariffs. (This information was posted in an industry group, not publicly.)
āŖļø The podcast Crowdfunding Nerds interviewed Hersh Glueck, Founder and CEO of Hero Time, a board game manufacturer in China, about how tariffs impact Chinese manufacturers, how publishers can tackle tariff challenges, and what effects they might have on global trade. (Note: The first four minutes are ads about a crowdfunding course sold by the podcast, so this might be too self-serving.)
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āŖļø In “Tackling Tariffs“, Justin D. Jacobson of Restoration Games details how the company has grown and evolved since its debut in 2016, how it’s approaching crowdfunding for its upcoming Battle Monsters campaign, and how the company will deal with the effects of tariffs:
While backers of its 2024 crowdfunding campaign for Unmatched Adventures: Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles won’t be asked for addition funds to cover tariff costs, “if the status quo holds, there is a real chance the game will not be available in standard distribution. It’s one thing to have your profit eaten up but quite another to literally lose money on every sale.”
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āŖļø In a long newsletter, Gene Billingsley of GMT Games details how tariffs will affect that company and what it plans to do in response, with the #1 issue to address being cashflow:
With the 145% tariff, though, those games will now cost over 1.2 MILLION dollars to get to our warehouse. That’s $700,000+ extra for…..basically nothing… As a business model, with that level of tariffs, printing at a pace we need to in order to cover our overhead, it’s unsustainable. Basically that group of three shipments alone, unless we make some big operational changes quickly, will eat up all of our cash reserves and leave us with no funds to pay our employees and other expenses.
In addition to offering a discount code (GMT25 for 25% off) to spur sales to increase its cash reserves, GMT Games aims to figure out how to ship games directly from China to non-U.S. P500 supporters, while bringing to the United States only exactly what stock is needed for P500 supporters and distributor sales.
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āŖļø HABA USA has notified its retail clients that in anticipation of the “ever-changing and unpredictable” tariff situation, “we were proactive and brought in larger than usual amounts of inventory at pre-tariff prices. Because of this, HABA USA will not be implementing any pricing changes at the present time.”
The company plans to reassess its inventory and pricing at the end of Q2 2025 and warns that back-ordered items and new 2025 products might have adjusted pricing depending on what the final costs will be.
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āŖļø LongPack Games and Toys reminded its clients that game production might be possible south of China:
For our ongoing productions in China, we’re offering dedicated storage services. This means we can securely store your products until you’re ready to ship, providing flexibility during these tariff adjustments.
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āŖļø On April 18, Gwen Ruelle and Samuel Bryant, designers of Fire Tower and co-owners of Runaway Parade Games, were featured on the NPR program “Here & Now” starting at 8:20.
āŖļø The custom print site ArtsCow will close as of April 30, 2025, writing “This was not a choice we made lightly and is a result of significant and sustained economic pressures, including the newly implemented U.S. tariffs and substantial increases in operating costs. Despite our best efforts to find alternative solutions, continued operation is no longer sustainable.”
āŖļø A couple of BGG users are tracking effects of tariffs in GeekLists: “The Effect of the 2025 US Tariffs on Individual Boardgames” and “Tariff Impacted Games & Publishers“.
āŖļø That wasn’t too succinct, was it?
āŖļø Update, April 24: Flat River Group had placed all of its productions on hiatus in mid-April 2025, and now it’s decided that it will have neither a booth nor meetings at Gen Con 2025 as originally planned. Given that FRG had one of the largest booths in the exhibit hall in 2024, I can understand why the company wouldn’t want to staff it with little new merchandise to sell and demo.