Lehigh Valley Morning Call

Embargo Limits Chinese Rug Supply

Photo: Ali Nejad stands on a Chinese carpet imported before the textile embargo.

by Allison Salerno

Shoppers looking for a handmade Chinese rug will have fewer choices this fall, the prime rug-selling season, dealers say.

The U.S. Commerce Department has imposed a trade embargo for the rest of the year on a wide category of Chinese-made textiles, including woolen rugs, because too many of them have already been sold in the United States this year.

The embargo has left rug dealers in the Lehigh Valley digging deeper than usual into their inventory.

The embargo, imposed last month, leaves Ali Nejad with a shipment of 100 sample rugs stuck at the Port of Philadelphia.

Nejad owns Nejad Gallery, which has stores in South Whitehall, Doylestown and Princeton. About half his sales in South Whitehall are Chinese rugs, he said. "They are becoming more and more popular," he said.

Nejad said this week he cancelled a buying trip to China because of the trade embargo. "There is going to be a shortage of rugs in certain colors and certain designs."