The useful operating record connects the tariff event to landed cost, realised price, unit movement, gross margin, and inventory already committed under earlier assumptions.
Retail landed cost establishes where the import-cost change enters the merchandise economics, while the price record shows how much of that change reaches the customer and when. The difference between those records identifies the portion still being carried in margin, sourcing, assortment, or inventory rather than presenting pass-through as a fixed outcome.
That distinction also keeps tariff pass-through separate from broader pricing power. Tariff pass-through is tied to a defined cost shock and a measurable price response. Broader pricing power includes product differentiation, promotion, mix, competition, and customer willingness to pay across conditions that may have nothing to do with trade policy. The financial record therefore remains centered on the cost increase, the realised price response, and the margin retained during the interval between them. That separation preserves the economic mechanism without extending the evidence beyond its observed scope. Where sustained cost absorption affects profitability,
retail profit recovery becomes the commercial route rather than another generic pricing argument.
