As the Trump administration weighs a new round of trade actions in 2026, major consumer brands across several industries are asking Washington to carve out exceptions for products they say cannot realistically be sourced at home. In food, that push has centered on Nestlé, Mars, McCormick and TreeHouse Foods, whose filings say ingredients such as coffee, palm oil, spices and aromatic rice are tied to climates and supply chains the United States does not have, according to Supply Chain Dive and federal trade records. The dispute matters nationally because any new duty on those imports would land first on food manufacturers and then move through to supermarket prices.
Major brands formally asked for exemptions
The clearest public marker of the fight came in early July, when Supply Chain Dive reported on July 10 that Nestlé, Mars, McCormick and other companies had submitted exemption requests to the Office of the U.S. Trade Representative ahead of public hearings. More than 1,500 stakeholders filed written responses seeking relief from proposed tariffs, according to that report. The requests covered ingredients and goods across sectors, but the food filings stood out because they focused on products companies said are not available domestically at the necessary scale.
The underlying federal process is active and time-specific. In the Federal Register, USTR said written comments on the Brazil Section 301 action were due July 1, 2026, and that a public hearing was scheduled for July 6, 2026, in Washington. That notice said the agency was proposing tariffs on articles from Brazil and invited comments on which products should be excluded, including whether a tariff would cause supply disruptions or fail to shift sourcing.
Nestlé asked for relief on products including palm oil and instant coffee, while Mars sought exemptions tied to basmati and jasmine rice, and McCormick requested relief for spices and herbs, according to Supply Chain Dive’s review of company submissions. TreeHouse Foods also flagged palm oil. The companies’ central argument was not that tariffs are inconvenient, but that some ingredients are functionally impossible to replace with U.S.-grown supply in the near term.
What the filings mean in the U.S. market
The immediate impact is national, because these ingredients flow into products sold across U.S. grocery, foodservice and convenience channels rather than into one isolated region. Reuters reported on July 8 that the National Coffee Association asked the administration to keep Brazilian green coffee exempt from tariffs and to add instant coffee to the tariff-free list, saying the category is important to U.S. manufacturing of ready-to-drink coffee, syrups and other products. Brazil supplies about one-third of U.S. coffee needs, according to Reuters.
What is confirmed is that companies and trade groups have asked for exemptions before tariffs are finalized. What is not yet known is which specific finished products, brands or retail categories would be affected if USTR denies those requests, because neither the agency nor the companies have released a comprehensive list linking every ingredient request to store-level SKUs. There also is no public final determination yet showing the full exemption list for every food input named in the comments reviewed here.
For consumers, that means the potential effect is easier to understand at the ingredient level than at the shelf level. Coffee, rice, seasoning blends, sauces, frozen meals and packaged foods often rely on imported inputs that cannot be quickly swapped out without reformulation or higher cost. If duties are applied, manufacturers may absorb part of that increase, seek supply-chain changes or pass through some share in prices, but company-by-company responses have not been fully detailed in the public record reviewed here.
The companies’ case: tariffs would raise costs, not reshore crops
The cause of the exemption campaign is the structure of the tariff proposals themselves. USTR’s Federal Register notice said commenters should address whether products are necessary raw materials, whether alternative sources exist at reasonable prices and quantities, and whether tariffs would create serious dislocations in supply. That framework opened the door for food manufacturers to argue that some imports are essential inputs rather than categories that can be reshored through trade pressure.
McCormick’s filing, as described by Supply Chain Dive, said exemptions for its spices and herbs were needed because of domestic availability limits and would “promote efficiencies in U.S. food ingredients manufacturing.” Nestlé similarly said domestic alternatives to certain palm oil imports with equivalent quality do not exist. Those arguments go to the core policy question: whether a tariff can change sourcing behavior when climate, geography and agricultural systems constrain where a crop can be grown.
Reuters’ reporting on the coffee industry adds a price dimension to that policy debate. The National Coffee Association said tariffs had contributed to visible price inflation on some coffee-related products, while the proposed Brazil action would impose a 25% tariff on certain imports from that country. As of July 15, Reuters reported the U.S. planned to impose that 25% tariff on some Brazilian goods under Section 301, showing that the exemption fight is unfolding alongside real trade action, not a theoretical policy review.