2025 was the year of Trump's tariffs – will 2026 be better for Italian wine in the US?

When Donald Trump was re-elected to the White House last year, the wine industry was placed on red alert as the threat of tariffs, the President's preferred tool for squeezing other countries, once again loomed.

European wine producers were especially concerned about how Trump might retaliate against the European Union. Early forecasts made for grim reading. In February 2025 the Unione Italiana Vini (UIV) predicted Italian wine in the US market to lose approximately €330 million in value. Later analysis suggested that the punitive tariffs might cost Italy's wine sector closer to €1 billion.

After months of uncertainty, 15% tariffs on European Union products imported into the US were imposed at the start of August.

But how do things look from the American side?

Volio is a specialist importer of Italian wine working with producers including Elena Fucci, Duca di Salaparuta and Tenuta Argentiera. Founded by Charles Lazzara in 2007, the business, based in Denver, Colorado, has continued to grow, but the last 12 months have still proven challenging.

Charles Lazzara

Thinking back to the end of 2024 and your expectations for 2025, has this year gone according to plan?

We are currently on track with our plan, which was to achieve growth of 15% at the beginning of the year. At the end of 2024 we were anticipating growth largely due to geographic expansion on existing lines of wine. Those programmes were put in place in Fall '24 for Spring '25. Although we were concerned about what would happen with the threat of tariffs, we were able to continue to achieve our goal for this year.

There were lots of reports of stockpiling of European wines in the US ahead of the introduction of new tariffs – is this something that Volio experienced?

Absolutely. With the amount of speculation that the President put on what the tariffs could be – at one point it was 100%, then it went to 200%, then 50% – there was so much uncertainty. In the early part of 2025 we moved to get as much inventory Stateside as we could, so that at least guaranteed price up until a certain point in the US market. Price stability is a critical component to building a market, and this uncertainty of price in the US has really been a challenge.

Who foots the cost of the tariffs? The producer, the importer, the retailer or the consumer?

This is the million dollar question. Ultimately, the price is borne by the customer. When the tariffs on French wine were introduced several years ago, they were put in place for a short time, and therefore the parties involved – producers, importers, wholesalers – could discuss who would help to absorb the cost for the brief amount of time that the tariffs were in place, to therefore not have an impact on the end consumer and whole price. In this circumstance, which we all recognise to be unique, the tariffs are now part of the cost of goods, and therefore the producer, the importer and the wholesaler have to pass that cost onto the customer, because they don't see it going away.

How have other economic factors worsened the effect of tariffs?

Initially, in the tariff discussions in late 2024 and early 2025, the conversations I was having with producers in my network concerned 'can we support the cost of tariffs' – wine is a low margin business, and there has been so much inflation post-Covid, that the conversation has always been around maintaining price continuity in the US market to build the brand.

With tariffs, you really have no opportunity to absorb tariffs, maintain price and continue to invest in the stability and/or opportunity for the growth of your brand in the US market. Knowing that costs will continue to increase on production, knowing that certain vintages which are coming to the US market in 2025 and 2026 are not abundant, it would be totally rational for a producer to say that their costs of production are up 3% or 5% and they make less wine, so they need to raise prices, and then you have tariffs on top. It's no longer about how we can maintain price, but how we avoid going up by two price points. Because there are three tiers in the US market, and the tariffs are on the cost of the wine the producers sell to me, that tariff gets enlargened twice – a €1 tariff is a US$3 increase on price on the shelf."

Is the full impact of the tariffs already apparent in the US wine market?

With the inventory that we had on hand and the uncertainty around tariffs, people had enough to get through Q1, Q2 and Q3 of 2025 – you are going to see the impact of tariffs hit the consumer in December 2025 and in the first months of 2026. In order for us as an importer to change price for a wholesaler, we have to give them 90 days notice – if we're moving into tariff-burdened wine in August, we would not be able to change that price until three months later.

We won't see how the consumer responds until 2026. It is my opinion that if they see a price increase this December, they may be less reactive because of the Holidays and they're spending money anyway – their economic concerns won't be seen until after Christmas, and that's when we'll see the impact at the cash register.

Dry January is just around the corner – is that cause for concern too?

Dry January has an impact too, but the sensibility of younger consumers to how much they consume is better than them not consuming at all. It's less about health concerns and more about the purchasing power of younger consumers: they may not need that bottle of wine that adds US$100 to their bill, they might start going out two nights a week instead of three. Purchasing power has been reduced by economic forces around them, but it is a good thing that people are more aware about what they're putting in their bodies. Ultimately, that helps my portfolio, because we're working with artisanal producers that follow organic or sustainable practices, which young consumers want to learn more about.

2025 is almost at an end – what is making you feel optimistic about 2026?

It's my opinion that we have been through the worst. There was so much uncertainty around tariffs, now we know what we're dealing with, we know how it affects price. All the risks of supply chain management are known risks, so we've got a pretty stable environment in terms of dealing with existential threats. Then it's just a case of how good we are at educating our customers and getting people to buy for the quality of the product, even if its price has increased in the last year.

What will help Italian wine to not just survive, but thrive in the US market next year?

European wines, and especially those from Italy, still offer tremendous value. Italian wine as a category is still growing relative to wine – Pinot Grigio and Prosecco are up in the US market, traditional method sparkling wine is really poised for explosive growth, we work with a tremendous Franciacorta producer, Berlucchi. We have seen 30% year-on-year growth every year going back to 2023, so this just shows that consumers are becoming more aware of these wines, and how they fit in the price point between Prosecco and what we might call 'glass pour' Champagne. US customers go to Italian restaurants, they want a sparkling wine to help elevate the experience, and if it's an Italian restaurant it needs to be an Italian wine, and that opens the door for regions like Franciacorta!

What can the wine industry as a whole do to improve its prospects in the US market in 2026?

Ultimately, some of the gaps in the US market are more fundamentally related to the barriers to entry and education in the three tiers. Buyers are really open to new things, it's one of the primary drivers of the development that you see in small wine retailers and successful restaurants – you have people engaging the customer and telling the stories that young consumers want to hear to engage in wine.

Where we see wines in that US$15-30 category drop off is when the message about all the work that goes into farming and production get lost, because they're not providing the right marketing materials and education to the distributor and ultimately to the retail buyer who passes it onto the consumer, and so because of that, those wines suffer. The US market is very challenging in that regard, but there is a tremendous appetite for wines of character.