Editorial Article
The 2018 Tariff Exempted the Flashlight. The 2025 One Did Not.
An exemption that expired
On 28 February 2025, Energizer wrote to its customers about tariffs. The letter is unusually explicit, and one sentence in it explains the entire economics of the portable lighting category better than any market forecast:
“This tariff impacts segments of products across all our categories, including portable lights, which was excluded from tariff increases in 2018.”
Read it as a piece of industrial history. When Washington built the first Section 301 architecture against Chinese imports, flashlights were carved out. In 2025, under the emergency-powers tariffs imposed in February and March, they were not. The same product, the same supply chain, a completely different cost base — and no exclusion process to argue about it.
Energizer also flagged the second blow, the 25% Section 232 duties on steel and aluminium from 12 March 2025, noting that battery cans are made of steel and that there is no exclusion request route. On 4 April 2025 it raised prices on batteries, portable lighting and auto care by between 2.2% and 5.1%.
Note what Energizer did not say. It did not say it manufactures in China — it says it has no manufacturing locations there, but procures materials there, and that the tariffs hit both its own purchases and its suppliers’. The price increase was not a China tariff pass-through. It was a pass-through of the cost of the metal.
The trade numbers say the tariff did not stop the trade
In 2025 the United States imported roughly USD 770 million of portable lighting under HS 8513 and exported about USD 140 million. China supplied USD 618 million of those imports — 80.3% of the total. Vietnam supplied USD 78.8 million, Thailand USD 23.7 million, Cambodia USD 14.5 million and Mexico USD 7.2 million. The US took 27.3% of world imports in 2024, more than any other country.
So the tariff did not remove China from the category. It re-priced the alternatives into existence. Between 2024 and 2025 Vietnam added USD 43 million of US-bound shipments and Thailand USD 23.5 million — which puts Vietnamese shipments at roughly double the prior year, because the 2025 total is USD 78.8 million.
The most recent month in the series makes the point harder. In June 2026, US portable lighting imports were USD 72.7 million against exports of USD 11.3 million, with year-on-year imports up 89.2%. That increase decomposed into China up USD 16.5 million (+52.9%), Vietnam up USD 9.99 million (+316%) and Cambodia adding USD 6.22 million from a negligible base. Two things are happening at once: the category is re-sourcing, and it is re-importing at a faster rate than before the tariffs existed.
Portable lighting is a rounding error inside lighting
Pheonix’s own lighting forecast puts the global lighting market at USD 132.60 billion in 2025, reaching USD 218.45 billion by 2033 at 6.48%. US portable lighting imports of USD 770 million are 0.58% of that.
That ratio is worth sitting with, because it explains why the category is analytically neglected and commercially durable at the same time. The lighting market is an installed-base business — luminaires, retrofit, controls, street lighting, smart buildings. A flashlight is not installed. It is bought, lost, and bought again, which makes it one of the few lighting products that behaves like a consumer staple rather than a construction material.
What actually changed inside the product
For most of its commercial life the flashlight was a razor-and-blades business: a cheap body, a proprietary lamp, and a continuous annuity in dry cells. That annuity was the category’s profit pool, and it was also why a flashlight could be sold at a low price without anybody losing money.
Rechargeable lithium-ion designs removed it. The cell moved inside the product, became the most expensive single component, and stopped being a repeat purchase. Two consequences follow, and they are the reason this article exists.
First, the cost stack inverted. In a rechargeable flashlight the light-emitting element is a commodity worth cents, the cell is the dominant bill-of-materials line, and the housing is metal — aluminium for a serious light, steel for a cheap one. The product is now a battery and a tube.
Second, the tariff landed on precisely that residue. The 25% Section 232 duties apply to steel and aluminium articles; the 20% emergency tariffs apply to the Chinese content of the supply chain. Neither applies to the LED. The duty structure therefore taxes the two things the product became after it stopped being a consumables business, and exempts the thing that had already been commoditised to near-zero.
That is the inversion worth carrying away: a category that was once protected by an exclusion from tariffs is now exposed by an exclusion that no longer exists, at the moment its recurring revenue disappeared.
What to watch, and what I will not forecast
The variable that decides this market’s next three years is not household penetration. It is whether the re-routing now under way in Vietnam, Thailand and Cambodia reaches scale before the tariff architecture changes again. A supplier that moves a mould and a cell-pack assembly line to Vietnam has made a five-year bet on a trade regime; if the regime moves again, the investment is stranded, which is why the June 2026 import surge is more informative than any annual average.
I am not putting a US flashlight market size in this piece. The trade data measures declared import value, which is a customs number and not a retail one; household penetration data measures ownership, which has been close to saturation for decades; and the retail measurement is distorted by the fact that most flashlights now ship inside other purchases — a tool kit, a car, a camping set. Three perimeters, three different answers, and a category whose units are increasingly invisible.
The one number that is both available and meaningful is the one above: 80.3% of American portable lighting imports still originate in China, two tariff rounds after the exemption ended. That is the measure of how much of this supply chain can actually move, as opposed to how much of it is being re-invoiced through a different port.
Frequently Asked Questions
How big is the US portable lighting trade?
The United States imported about USD 770 million of portable lighting (HS 8513) in 2025, against exports of roughly USD 140 million. China supplied about USD 618 million of those imports — 80.3% of the total — followed by Vietnam at USD 78.8 million, Thailand at USD 23.7 million, Cambodia at USD 14.5 million and Mexico at USD 7.2 million. The US accounted for 27.3% of world imports in 2024, ranking first.
Why did tariffs affect flashlights in 2025 but not in 2018?
Because portable lighting was explicitly carved out of the 2018 tariff increases. Energizer's February 2025 customer letter states this directly, noting that the 20% of incremental IEEPA tariffs on Chinese imports imposed in February and March 2025 affect "portable lights, which was excluded from tariff increases in 2018." Energizer also flagged the 25% Section 232 steel and aluminium tariffs from 12 March 2025, noting that battery cans are made of steel and that there is no exclusion request process — then announced price increases of 2.2% to 5.1% on battery, portable lighting and auto care products effective 4 April 2025.
Did the tariffs reduce Chinese imports of flashlights?
Not according to the trade data. China still supplied 80.3% of US portable lighting imports in 2025. What the tariffs changed was the growth rate of the alternatives: between 2024 and 2025 Vietnam added USD 43 million and Thailand USD 23.5 million of US-bound shipments. In June 2026, year-on-year US imports of portable lighting rose 89.2%, with China up 52.9% in dollar terms, Vietnam up 316% and Cambodia from a very small base.
What is the structural problem with the flashlight category?
The category's original business model was consumables: the light was cheap and the batteries were not. Rechargeable lithium-ion designs removed that annuity, moving the cost into the cell and the housing. The tariff then landed on exactly that residue — steel and aluminium — rather than on the part of the product that had already stopped generating recurring revenue. A rechargeable aluminium-bodied flashlight is now a bet on metal and cells, not on lighting.