Why Retailers Must Prepare for a Year of 'Start, Stop, Pivot' Logistics

Peak season always comes with complexity, but what retailers are currently dealing with in 2025 is something altogether different: a year defined by the constant drift of shifting rules. New tax regulations, documentation requirements, and carrier volatility have all forced meaningful operational adjustments. Together, they’ve rewritten the playbook for how to conquer this critical period.

The Tariff Domino Effect

One of the clearest examples is tariffs. Throughout the year, merchants experimented with ways to offset duties and surtaxes, including shifting fulfillment from the U.S. to overseas hubs. Some retailers attempted to avoid Canada’s 25 percent surtax by routing parcels through the UK or EU. On paper, the strategy was sound.

In practice, many ran into a reality most consumers never see: product restrictions. Import rules are highly origin-specific, and a SKU that moves easily from the U.S. into Canada can become restricted the moment it originates in Europe. Retailers often discovered this only after shipments stalled at the border, classifications changed, or landed costs surged. What seemed like a smart workaround in planning models quickly turned into a midseason setback

The operational fallout wasn’t the only concern; shoppers felt the turbulence, too. When duties or taxes appear inconsistent or unclear at checkout, conversion drops. Unpredictability itself became a deterrent, particularly for cross-border customers who don’t want surprises when a package arrives.

Forecasting Around Regulatory Whiplash

Forecasting has become equally tangled. Instead of preparing for a single, predictable holiday peak, retailers have had to plan around rolling surges shaped by regulatory timing as much as consumer demand. A newly implemented tariff can accelerate inventory decisions; a withdrawn duty can postpone them. Mexico’s new requirement for both shipper and recipient tax IDs is one recent example of how a seemingly administrative change can influence clearance times, customer expectations, and even cart abandonment — especially among first-time international buyers unfamiliar with the documentation.

For larger merchants with compliance teams, this is a heavy but manageable lift. For small marketplace sellers, it’s often the first time they’re encountering the realities of HS codes, de minimis thresholds, or product restrictions. Many learned the hard way that classification errors create delays and change the economics of a product line overnight.

Carrier Networks: Planning for Instability, Not Reliability

Carrier strategy has also undergone a quiet but significant shift. After Canada Post disruptions in 2024 stranded parcels during the height of holiday peak, several major retailers began instructing sellers months in advance to avoid postal networks altogether for final-mile delivery in Canada. That decision reshaped routing patterns across the industry.

Those delays made it clear that networks clog quickly. Parcels caught in backlogs last year faced average delays of eight days to 21 days, depending on region and volume. Strikes and interruptions will continue to occur, and when they happen during peak, recovery is slow and the customer impact is significant.

As a result, contingency routing and diversified multicarrier strategies have become the foundation of peak season planning.

The Playbook for 2025 and Beyond: Build for Agility

None of these pressures make peak season unmanageable, but they do demand a different approach. Many retailers are turning to bonded warehouses or foreign trade zones to delay duties until the moment of fulfillment. Others are narrowing their country lists to focus on markets where customs behavior is more predictable. And a growing number are developing flexible, midseason response plans — e.g., alternate carriers, alternate routings, pre-cleared SKU lists — that can be activated without disrupting operations.

Peak season will be defined by how effectively retailers adapt to the steady accumulation of smaller shifts that shape the holiday calendar. The merchants that build systems able to pivot without panic will be the ones that protect margins and preserve customer trust when it matters most.

Helaine Rich is vice president of strategic sales and administration at ePost Global, a provider of international parcel and mail shipping solutions.