Abstract
Matel the maker of Barbie dolls and Hot Wheels cars, is recalling
nearly one million toys in the United States today because the products
are covered in lead paint.
Susan Etheridge for The New York Times
Nickelodeon, which owns Dora the Explorer, says it will keep a closer
eye on its toy makers.
According to Mattel, all the toys were made by a contract manufacturer
in China.
The recall, the second biggest this year involving toys, covers 83
products made from April 19 to July 6. Many of them feature Sesame
Street and Nickelodeon characters — including the Elmo Tub Sub, the
Dora the Explorer Backpack, and the Giggle Gabber, a toy shaped like
Elmo or Cookie Monster that toddlers shake to hear giggles and funny
noises.
Mattel says it prevented more than two-thirds of the 967,000 affected
toys from reaching consumers by stopping the products in its distribution
centers and contacting retailers, like Wal-Mart, Target and Toys
‘R’ Us, late last week. But more than 300,000 of the tainted toys
have been bought by consumers in the United States. According to
the Consumer Product Safety Commission, the toys may have a date
code from 109-7LF to 187-7LF on the product or packaging.
A complete list can be found at nytimes.com, mattel.com or cpsc.gov.
Mattel is hardly the first manufacturer to encounter a breakdown in
the Chinese production chain. In recent months, factories in China
have been sources of poisonous pet food sold in stores in the United
States, dangerous car tires, and lead paint on the popular Thomas
& Friends wooden toys.
The Chinese government has said it is working to improve its product
regulations, even as members of Congress have called for legislation
requiring more inspections of imports from China.
This is Mattel’s 17th recall in 10 years. Most recently, an infant
swing made by its Fisher-Price division was taken off the market
because of a risk children could be trapped in its moving parts.
And in its largest consumer action involving toy safety, in 1998,
the company recalled more than 10 million Power Wheels cars.
Speaking of the new recall, Nancy A. Nord, acting Consumer Product
Safety Commission chairwoman, said in a statement, “These recalled
toys have accessible lead in the paint, and parents should not hesitate
in taking them away from children.”
The statement said that the commission had stated an investigation
and that “ensuring that Chinese made toys are safe for U.S. consumers
is one of my highest priorities and is the subject of vital talks
currently in place between C.P.S.C. and the Chinese government.”
Earlier this summer, RC2, the maker of Thomas trains, recalled 1.5
million trains and accessories because a Chinese supplier had coated
them in lead paint. At that time, consumer safety experts and toy
industry analysts said that Mattel was unlikely to face such a problem.
“There are companies that live up to their obligations to the government
as well as to consumers, and they are one of them,” Julie Vallese,
a spokeswoman for the Consumer Product Safety Commission, said of
Mattel in mid-July.
But Mattel’s safety checks — which include independent audits of facilities
and ownership of many of its own factories in China — did not prevent
the chain of events that led to today’s recall.
In early July, according to Mattel executives, one of the European
retailers that sells Mattel toys discovered the lead on some products.
On July 6, Mattel stopped operations at the factory that produced
the toys and initiated an investigation.
On July 18, Mattel took a reporter for The New York Times on a tour
of a factory in Guanyao, China, and of Mattel’s toy safety lab in
Shenzhen. At that time, Mattel executives say, it was unclear whether
Mattel was facing a widespread lead paint problem, or if the European
case was an anomaly.
Last Thursday, the same day The Times ran an article about Mattel’s
toy safety procedures, the company’s executives say they received
conclusive data that persuaded them to recall the 83 products. Then,
the company contacted retailers who stocked the toys.
“This is a vendor plant with whom we’ve worked for 15 years; this
isn’t somebody that just started making toys for us,” Robert A. Eckert,
the chief executive of Mattel, said in an interview. “They understand
our regulations, they understand our program, and something went
wrong. That hurts.”
Mattel requires the factories it contracts with to use paint and other
materials provided by certified suppliers. Mattel executives said
they did not know if the contract manufacturer substituted paint
from a noncertified supplier or if a certified supplier caused the
problem.
Mr. Eckert said Mattel was considering various ways to overcome the
problem, including reducing the amount of toys it makes through contract
factories. About 50 percent of Mattel’s revenue comes from toys made
in 11 factories it owns and operates. That is a high share for the
toy industry.
But the other half comes from toys that it outsources to up to 50
manufacturers in China. Those toys tend to be short-term products
that feature characters from movies and television shows rather than
Barbie dolls or other Mattel brands.
In light of the recalls, Nickelodeon — which owns the characters Dora
the Explorer and Diego — has decided to introduce a third-party monitor
to check up on all of the companies that make toys under its brands,
including Mattel.
Sesame Workshop, the nonprofit organization behind the “Sesame Street”
program, is considering adding third-party testing, Gary E. Knell,
president and chief executive of Sesame Workshop, said in a statement.
This summer, the Toy Industry Association has been working with the
Consumer Product Safety Commission on new regulations to require
more stringent safety checks. Carter Keithley, president of the association,
said the federal government needed to help the industry block China
from using lead paint.
“We don’t have lead paint in this country any more, and they shouldn’t
either,” Mr. Keithley said of China. “If there was no lead paint,
then we wouldn’t have this problem.”
Thomas G. Rawski, an economics professor at the University of Pittsburgh,
who has visited factories in China regularly since 1975, though not
toy factories, said companies there are trying to check product quality,
but more improvements are needed.
“The mechanisms for preventing this stuff don’t leap out of a tree,”
Mr. Rawski said. “They have to be built up carefully, and I think
it’s very clear this process of building is going on in China right
now. That means there are lots of things happening that in an ideal
world shouldn’t be happening, including things that wouldn’t happen
in Japan or the U.S.”
Description
May08
Links and resources
Tags