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There are a lot of issues President Trump could be worried about right now, from dealing with the repercussions of his global tariff war to investigating why his administration’s war plans were direct messaged to a journalist. Instead, hes preoccupied with your showerhead. Thats right: On Wednesday, just after announcing that the U.S. would levy a head-turning 125% tariff on all Chinese imports, Trump was busy signing an executive order about showerheads. The order, called Maintaining Acceptable Water Pressure in Showerheads, details Trumps plan to make showers great again (a point emphasized by Trumps right-hand man, Elon Musk, on X) and restore shower freedom. I like to take a nice shower to take care of my beautiful hair, Trump told reporters yesterday in the Oval Office. I stand under the shower for 15 minutes until it gets wet. It comes out drip, drip, drip. Its ridiculous. Shower pressure is an issue thats been top of mind for Trump since his first administration, and hes commented on it several times over the years. According to a press release, the new executive order is aimed at undoing the lefts war on water pressure which involved a radical green agenda. This bizarre and poorly timed detour for the Trump administration begs the question: How much control does the federal government actually have over your showerhead? What has the government been doing with my showerhead? The federal government cant actually dictate how individual companies design their showerheads. It can, however, issue regulations on water pressure to curb energy waste. The most overarching ruling to that end was passed by Congress in 1992. The Energy Policy Act was a wide-reaching set of federal laws for improved energy efficiency, which also included new guidelines for electric utilities, industrial facilities, and even enacted some energy-saving protocols for the postal service. Among all of these guidelines was a new standard: The maximum water use allowed for any showerhead manufactured after January 1, 1994, is 2.5 gallons per minute. The 2.5 gallon per minute limit (which, by experts standards, is quite a lot of water), still stands today, and 14 states have adopted their own guidelines which save even more water. [In 1992], as now, many parts of the country faced water supply crunches driven by population growth and, in some places, drought, says Andrew deLaski, executive director of the Appliance Standards Awareness Project (ASAP). At the same time, water and wastewater rates and bills were increasing. Setting these standards helped ease these problems. But DeLaski says the 2.5 gallon per minute regulation doesnt actually have much to do with water pressure. The federal standard is a performance standardit does not dictate showerhead design or water pressure, he says. Instead, manufacturers ensure good water pressure by including something called a pressure compensating valve in their showerheads, and thats what customers should look for if theyre having a lackluster showering experience. Both Wirecutter and Consumer Reports have published instructive, up-to-date lists of showerheads that give the best spray for your buck. Generally, chronic poor water pressure tends to be a symptom of a plumbing problem or build-up on the showerhead. The great nozzle debacle Despite the fact that its perfectly possible to bask under a strong water stream without upping the 2.5 gallon per minute limit, Trump seems set on finding a loophole that will allow him to bathe his beautiful hair in countless gallons per minute. His executive order isnt actually rolling back the existing guidelines, but it is essentially bending the rules to permit an extra gluttonous shower. The workaround has everything to do with nozzles. As previously mentioned, the 2.5 gallon rule has been in place for more than three decades. However, new stipulations have been added since then. In the mid-2010s, showers with multiple nozzles started to gain popularity, leading the Obama administration to establish a new definition of showerhead that defined a multi-nozzle shower as possessing only one showerhead, rather than allowing each nozzle to use 2.5 gallons of water per minute. In 2020, during his first term, Trump parried Obamas amendment with one of his own, defining each nozzle as a separate showerhead so that, theoretically, a shower with three nozzles could douse the user with 7.5 gallons per minute. Trumps edit came complete with a diagram of potential multi-nozzle shower designs, which seems like the kind of thing that only a billionaire could dream up. When Biden took office, he reinstated the Obama administrations showerhead definitiononly for Trump to rescind it once again this week. Trumps executive order on Wednesday essentially reinstates his 2020 2.5 gallons-per-nozzle definition. Showerheads seem to be a pet peeve of President Trumphe keeps bringing them up, DeLaski says. But his concerns are outdatedwhile there were problems with showerheads sold in the 1990s, those problems have long since been solved by manufacturers’ modern designs. Trumps concerns are so outdated, in fact, that ASAP asnt come across any companies which have tried to capitalize on the nozzle loophole. While Trump can technically alter the federal definition of a showerhead, it’s unlikely that your shower experience is going to change materially any time soon. We’re not aware of any manufacturer that took advantage of the loophole during the first Trump term, which makes sense since they are not having trouble making excellent showerheads that meet and beat the standard, DeLaski says. They also still need to comply with the state standards. That said, there are dozens of manufacturers of showerheads and it seems likely that some manufacturer or importer will seek to exploit the loopholeand some consumers will get stuck with needlessly wasteful products that drive up their utility bills.
Category:
E-Commerce
Calling this a chaotic week on Wall Street might be underselling the situation. We’ve seen drops of more than 2,000 points in the Dow and then gains of even more. In the past five days, the Dow has swung almost 3,300 points. That volatility has pushed more than a dozen companies to shelve their IPO plans, including some of the years most-highly anticipated debuts. StubHub and Klarna, both of which have already filed their prospectuses with the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC), have delayed their plans. Fintech company Chime, which reportedly was on the verge of revealing its SEC filing, changed its mind at the last minute last week. Mergers and acquisitions? Things arent much better there. The first quarter of this year saw fewer than 80 M&A announcementsthe lowest quarterly total since Q2 2020and things arent looking much sunnier for Q2. But its not just Donald Trumps tariffsor the global responsethat’s spooking markets. The real problem is the complete lack of predictability about what happens next. What will the U.S. reciprocal tariff ratemost of which Trump paused on Wednesday for 90 daysend up being for affected countries? Will the disruption be temporary, or will Trump keep these in place for the rest of his term? How will all of this ripple through global supply chains? There are, unfortunately, no hard answers to any of these questions. The Venture Capital conundrum That’s not only making it confusing for consumers, economists, and business owners, it’s making startup owners worry about their odds of finding venture capital funding. That’s understandable, but it’s worth remembering that the disorder surrounding tariffs and the market has been going on for just one weekand that’s hardly enough time to have any real impact on the funding space. Still, venture firms that back companies approaching an IPO or exit are the most likely to feel the squeeze, investors say. “Investors are trying to figure out ‘how is this going to shake out?'” says Matt Murphy, a partner at Menlo Ventures. “I think that has a bigger impact for the later versus the early stage market. Your valuations are higher and you’re betting on the P&L and the financials of the company; whereas early on, you’re betting on product, team, and market.” Many of Menlos portfolio companies are digital-basedmeaning tariffs, as currently structured, wont directly affect them since they dont sell physical goods. The bigger worry is whether potential customers will hoard cash and delay or skip new software purchases altogether. “It’s not the direct impact of the tariffs [for them], it’s the indirect,” says Murphy. And looming over all this, of course, is the threat of a recession. Moody’s economist Mark Zandi is still pegging the odds of a recession this year at 60%, even with Trumps 90-day tariff pause. Users of the prediction market Kalshi put the odds even higher, at 70%up from just 40% a week ago. JPMorgan says the Russell 2000 Index is now pricing in a 79% chance of an economic downturn. A recession would not only impact consumers, it would also potentially dampen investments, again because businesses would have a harder time selling their product. It would not, however, be devastating for funding companies, says Murphy. “Ultimately, we’ll figure out some new equilibrium around these tariffs,” he says. “Venture will find its normal footing, and the value and impact of the technology will trump [a possible] recession.”
Category:
E-Commerce
Theres now an e-bike that can be powered with the same charger you use for your MacBook. But like many innovations in the electric space, if youre in the U.S. youll have to wait to get your feet in the pedals. The new bike is from Estonian e-bike company Ampler, which bills it as the worlds first USB-C chargeable e-bike. It comes in two models, the Nova and Nova Pro, both currently available for preorder at a cost of roughly $2,800 and $3,300, respectively. The first batch is expected to ship in June. No need to carry around a bulky, custom, bike-specific power block, Kristjan Maruste, chief technology officer at Ampler, says in a YouTube video announcing the Nova. Charge your bike wherever you areat home, on the go, or even in the office. The addition of a USB-C port is a smart move that could make e-bikes more accessible (even allowing them to serve as supplementary phone chargers on the go). As of right now, though, the Nova bike is available only to customers in the U.K., EU, and Switzerlandand, given that the Trump administrations new tariffs will likely hit the American e-bike industry hard, it could be quite some time before USB-C chargeable e-bikes pop up here. [Photo: Ampler Bikes] “A secret race” Most e-bikes on the market today require a special charger designed to work with the voltage of the bikes battery and plug-in design. Often, these chargers are patented by the company selling the bike and designed so that the bikes are compatible only with the companys chargers. This can present a few challenges, including the fact that riders have to remember to pack the charger if they expect to run down the battery, and that many chargers come with a large attached power block. Chargers also add to the bike’s overall cost: The Trek Hyena Gen 2 charger costs $85, for example, while the Bosch 4A standard charger costs $135.50. To address these issues, Ampler designed its Nova bikes with a USB-C port incorporated directly into their frame. Its the same kind of charger thats compatible with devices like the iPhone 16e, MacBook Pro, and most wireless headphonesmeaning you probably already have one lying around. The bike’s port also works in the opposite direction, letting you top off your phones battery on the go. This idea began at one of our company hackathons back in 2020, when we asked ourselves the question, Why cant e-bikes be charged with laptop chargers? Maruste says in the announcement video. According to Kaja Aulik, brand and campaign marketer at Ampler, it turned out that many other companies had theorized, planned, and tried to implement this swap, but e-bike technology hadnt caught up yet. Luckily, she says, many engineers at Ampler had already worked to create the first USB-C chargeable e-scooter, so there was a solid base of experience to start with. The main challenge in implementing the USB-C charger was ensuring that the technology actually worked quickly and smoothly enough. The finished product takes three hours to fully charge and has a range of 50 to 100 kilometers, depending on road conditions. (That’s on the quicker side for a lithium-ion e-bike battery, which typically takes four to seven hours to charge to 100%.) It was a secret race against companies way larger, older, and wealthier, Aulik says. Nimbleness and agility were important to keep in mind. Uncertain terrain for American e-bikes This new development comes as American e-bike production is on uncertain terrain, to say the least. On Wednesday, President Donald Trump announced tariffs of 125% on Chinese imports. By some estimates, more than 90% of e-bikes sold in the U.S. are either fully assembled in China or contain Chinese-made parts. Even brands that manufacture their e-bikes on American soil still rely on parts shipped from China and other countries. On top of the burdensome new tariffs, Trumps administration has also removed the de minimis loophole that allowed products under $800 to be imported from China without tariffs, adding yet another extra cost for bike manufacturers. Amid this landscape, its going to be significantly harder (and more expensive) to ship e-bikes to the U.S. and to build them here. As American e-bike companies work just to hit ther bottom line, it might be some time before they get around to innovating on their charger portsmeaning consumers in the U.S. will be using traditional e-bike chargers for the foreseeable future.
Category:
E-Commerce
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