Canada-U.S. Trade Talks Collapse, Tariffs Take Effect

Trade talks between Canada and the United States collapsed late last week, and a new round of U.S. tariffs, 50 percent on roughly $20 billion of Canadian goods including hockey sticks, building materials, liquor, and clothing, took effect at midnight on August 22. Prime Minister Mark Carney said Canada would match the tariffs dollar for dollar, announcing counter-tariffs on an equivalent value of U.S. products effective September 8. In his statement, Carney said the government's objectives throughout negotiations included preserving tariff-free access for the vast majority of Canadian businesses and protecting small and medium-sized businesses from the impact of new duties.

If you or your clients sell physical goods across the border or source supplies from the U.S., cost of goods and launch timelines may shift depending on which categories fall under the new tariffs. Watch for pricing and cost pass-through messaging as the September 8 counter-tariff date approaches.

Online Retail Sales Jump 9.9% in June, StatCan Reports

Statistics Canada's June retail trade report, released last week, showed overall retail sales rose 0.6 percent to $74.3 billion, but the standout number was online. Seasonally adjusted e-commerce sales climbed 9.9 percent to $5.7 billion, pushing online sales to 7.7 percent of total retail trade, up from 7.1 percent in May. General merchandise retailers and clothing, footwear, and accessories both posted solid gains, while food and beverage retailers were the only core category to decline.

The acceleration in online spending, and the category-level detail behind it, gives Canadian merchants in general merchandise and apparel a clearer read on where to prioritize ad spend and inventory heading into fall.

Canadians Trust Billboards More Than Digital Ads, Study Finds

Canadian Tire Corporation reported second quarter 2026 results on August 13, with normalized diluted earnings per share up 10.4 percent to $3.94. The company credited its in-house AI pricing tool, called DaiVID, with enabling strategic price cuts on more than 5,000 products while protecting overall margins, and e-commerce comparable sales climbed 12 percent for the quarter. The Triangle Rewards loyalty program keeps expanding too, with a Tim Hortons Rewards partnership set to launch this fall alongside existing tie-ins with Petro-Canada, RBC, and WestJet.

As more creative production shifts to AI tools, weigh the tradeoff between efficiency gains and the trust penalty consumers appear to apply to AI-generated ads, particularly in higher-stakes or trust-dependent categories.

Shopify Expands Cross-Border Tools to Canadian Merchants

Shopify is rolling out Managed Markets, its cross-border ecommerce infrastructure, to eligible Canadian merchants, with Global-e Online acting as merchant of record for international transactions. The service handles duties, import taxes, international tax registration, customs requirements, localized currencies, and parts of international shipping, letting merchants keep running their Shopify store while Global-e manages the complexity behind cross-border orders. Canada remains an early-access market, with the rollout currently limited to certain eligible stores rather than Shopify's full Canadian merchant base.

For Canadian brands eyeing U.S. or international expansion, this lowers the operational bar for cross-border selling that previously required building infrastructure in-house or stitching together multiple vendors. Worth watching as eligibility widens.

Why AI Rollouts Stall Inside Canadian Companies

At the Council of Canadian Innovators' Innovation Governance Summit last week, three Canadian technology executives, from Compugen, Tactable, and Nakisa, discussed why AI adoption frequently dies inside IT departments. Compugen's Mark Zarek said handing AI to the technology department as a stack to buy typically means it gets tested, parked, and left on the shelf, while projects that survive need a named executive sponsor with a personal stake in the outcome. The panel, moderated by a director from Deloitte Canada's Human Capital practice, argued that ownership, not technology, is usually the harder part of AI deployment.

For SMBs and marketing teams piloting AI tools, this is a reminder that adoption succeeds or fails based on who owns the initiative internally, not just which tool gets purchased. Assign a specific, senior owner before rolling out new AI marketing tools rather than leaving it to IT alone.