April the 5th, 2025 – The unpopular Trump tariffs may well result in layoffs for the Croatian company HS Produkt. The Karlovac-based weapons company could let 1000 employees go.
As Poslovni Dnevnik/Jadranka Dozan writes, although the trade between Croatia and the United States has a relatively small share in the total export and import of goods, it will still have an effect. The Trump tariffs that have left most of the world scratching their heads won’t bypass even countries without much industry. Those same Trump tariffs will have a dire effect on the Croatian company HS Produkt, a weapons manufacturer from Karlovac. The US market accounts for around 70% of HS Produkt’s exports and business.
The Karlovac-based company is behind practically the entire export of revolvers and pistols to the US, which exceeded 90.7 million euros in 2024. This, in turn, represents around 11% of total Croatian exports to the US market.
HS Produkt from Karlovac is one of the three largest pistol manufacturers in the entire world. Between 70 and 80 percent of their products (rather unsurprisingly) go across the Atlantic to the USA, and not Europe. Director Željko Pavlin, revealed to Večernji list that the Trump tariffs of 20% could seriously harm the Croatian company HS Produkt.
He said that up to 1,000 workers out of a total of 1,920 could end up being laid off due to these wildly unpopular tariffs. He explained that Washington has a trade surplus with the EU when it comes to weapons.
“Our manufacturer has a long-standing partner in the well-known American manufacturer “Springfield Armory”, which also sells Croatian products as part of its own brand. That means that the deal with HS Produkt is important to it financially. They also have particularly good relations with the Republicans, and therefore the Trump administration,” Pavlin explained.
Although the export of medicines to the USA is higher overall, pharmaceutical companies are less affected by the US tariffs. This is partly owing to exemptions under the US policy of reciprocal tariffs, and partly due to the fact that their exports are dispersed across a large number of markets. Medicines hold the largest share in Croatian exports to the US, amounting to over 27 percent in 2024, with medicines exported for more than 220 million euros. Overall, in the structure of exports, as well as imports, one of the more important features is a relatively high concentration.
On the export side to the US, more than three-quarters of its financial statement refers to just six product groups. On the import side, as much as 72 percent of the total refers to just one product category – gaseous hydrocarbons, or LNG. Of the remaining imports from the US market, more than 10 million euros in import value last year was achieved only in the segment of medical instruments and apparatus (almost 15 million euros) and turbojet engines, or gas turbines (10.8 million euros).
It’s also worth mentioning that only about 40 product groups had imports from the US exceeding the value of one million euros in 2024. At the same time, this was the case with about 60 product groups in exports (according to the combined nomenclature KN4 of the Central Bureau of Statistics).
On the Croatian export side, the second largest is that of artificial fibres. They were sold across the pond in the US last year for a value of 143.7 million euros. The top 3 export items were also blood products for therapeutic, prophylactic or diagnostic use, as well as antiserum and vaccines, which were exported for almost 96 million euros.
Over ten million euros of exports were also achieved in the export of machinery for processing and refining rubber and plastics (plastic masses), which were sold in the US for almost 35 million euros. In addition, slightly more than 27 million euros of exports were realised by Croatian companies from the sale of moulds for metal foundries and model plates.
