What an Alaskan Furniture Company Tells Us About Tariffs
Odd Lots
Bloomberg
4.4 • 1.6K Ratings
🗓️ 11 August 2025
⏱️ 36 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
Alaska is no stranger to supply chain issues and a higher cost of living. Almost everything has to be imported into the state, incurring longer lead times and extra transportation costs — and that’s even before adding in the new tariffs from the Trump administration. In this episode, we speak with Dave Cavitt, the founder and CEO of Furniture Enterprises of Alaska, which owns furniture stores for brands including La-Z-Boy, Mattress Firm, Ashley’s Furniture, and many more. We talk to him about the logistical challenges of selling furniture in Alaska, consumer demand right now, the impact of the tariffs, and much more.
Read more:
Who Loses the Most From Trump’s Tariffs? Who Wins?
US, Japan Working to Announce Reciprocal Tariffs Won’t Stack
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| 0:00.0 | It might be enticing to try and sleep through the next four years, but if you're wondering how to survive a second Trump term while staying fully conscious, Pazza of America is here to help you process what's happening now and what comes next. I'm John Favreau and Tommy Vitor, John Lovett, and Dan Pfeiffer and I wade hip deep into the week's political news and fish out some political analysis you can trust. Yes, Tommy's shoes get ruined. |
| 0:02.9 | Yes, he'll do it again tomorrow, because the endeavor is worth it, Tommy's shoes get ruined. |
| 0:23.6 | Yes, he'll do it again tomorrow because the endeavor is worth it. |
| 0:24.7 | And so is your sanity. |
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| 0:35.0 | Bloomberg Audio Studios. |
| 0:37.8 | Podcasts Radio News. |
| 0:53.0 | Hello and welcome to another episode of the Odd Lots Podcast. I'm Tracy Allaway. |
| 0:54.2 | And I'm Joe Wisenthal. |
| 0:59.4 | Joe, can I start this conversation with what will seem like a random story, but I swear I have a point. |
| 1:05.2 | Go on. Okay, so a long, long time ago when I was visiting my mother in Beijing one winter, |
| 1:10.6 | she was working out there. Beijing winters are really cold. They're really dry. And I was sat in her apartment and all of a sudden I hear this giant crack. |
| 1:13.9 | And I run downstairs. |
| 1:15.2 | And it turns out the console that the TV was on had just like completely split in half because the air was so dry. |
| 1:21.6 | And it was so freaking cold. |
| 1:23.6 | And I had never considered that you could have weather locations where the weather was so extreme that you actually had to factor that into your furniture. |
| 1:31.3 | I never thought, I mean, I do have one sort of connection to that, which is we're going to start bragging about our international experiences, et cetera. |
| 1:40.3 | You know, I mentioned my family lived in Malaysia for a year. We bought this big round |
| 1:45.7 | table that we brought back with us to Illinois. And I do remember now that there was some |
| 1:50.1 | discussion about like, oh, this was designed for the humidity of Malaysia, et cetera, maybe have some |
| 1:55.4 | natural give, et cetera, but it's fine. But it's funny you say that because, yes, now I would not |
| 2:00.4 | have remembered that otherwise. |
... |
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