Did someone say tariffs on websites?

Someone asked me last month whether my prices on my website packages were going to go up if "you know who" started his tariff shenanigans again...

I stared at that message for a hot minute... then I went to google to ask if that could be a real thing or not...

Then I pictured a border agent holding my client's homepage mockup up to the light, turning it over, checking for a serial number, asking me if I had anything to declare.

(Four fonts, sir. Three of them are Poppins.)

Good news for literally everyone: you cannot tariff a website. Pixels do not clear customs, and thankfully, there is no duty payable on a well-placed call to action ;)

The files I build for you cross the border the same way they always have... instantly, invisibly, and with zero paperwork for either of us.

So yes, if you're not one of my Canadian clients, then I should probably let you know that Empty Desk Solutions is very much open for business, and that absolutely includes every one of you outside Canada. Nothing about my pricing, my process, or my availability has changed.

I could stop here for today, but instead, I thought it would be fun to share some facts about Canadian businesses (and for my peeps that want to support even more Canadian businesses, there are a few really great sites online that rank just how Canadian a product really is. Worth a look).

5 Facts about Canadian Businesses:

1. Almost all of us are tiny.

98% of Canadian businesses are small businesses. More than half have fewer than four employees, and there are roughly 1.8 million solopreneurs on top of that. When you hire a Canadian business, you are statistically speaking, hiring a person. Possibly a person in leggings like me... Definitely a person who is going to answer your email him or herself.

2. There is no tariff code for a website.

Every physical thing that crosses a border gets a classification number. There are codes for live horses. There are codes for umbrellas. There is a code for "articles of a kind normally carried in the pocket." There is not one for a Podia site, because a Podia site is not a thing in a box, it's just... there. Wherever you are. The moment I hit publish.

3. A lot of us are already in your time zone.

I'm in British Columbia, which is Pacific time, same clock as Seattle and LA. My UK and Australia folks, I have you both saved in my phone's world clock and I have absolutely done a 6am call in a hoodie for you. Many of you have probably seen my "website building outfit", which is a cozy housecoat that I wear for said early morning calls when the house is still freezing 🥶

4. We will spell it your way.

Colour, favourite, organised. That's my default and I'm not sorry about the extra letters. But if your audience is American and you want your website to match, I'll switch without a fight. (I will keep saying "sorry" in our emails though. That's kind of one of those weird Canadian things)

5. We are not our governments. And neither are you.

This is the one I'd actually like to connect the dots with though, because although tensions may seem high, we are actually in this together.

Trade policy gets made in rooms that none of us have ever been in, by people who have never once thought about your launch date or whether YOUR small business deserves to be caught up in all this 💩. The woman over here building your website and working on your marketing has precisely zero influence over any of it, and is mostly thinking about whether her coffee went cold again. Spoiler alert... it did. But I have a great microwave hah!

I have clients in the States, in the UK, in Australia, and all over Canada. I've even been built a bilingual site for a lovely woman in Serbia! Not one of those relationships is about which flag is on the invoice. They're about someone having an idea and needing help putting it somewhere people can find it.

That hasn't changed and I don't think it's going to.

So: business is still business, people are still people, my calendar still has spots, and your website still does not need to clear customs.

👉 Book a free 10-minute coffee chat and let's talk about what you're building.

-Brittany