Mattel and Toy Safety - Research Paper Example

 Mattel and Toy Safety Introduction Mattel, Inc. is a leader in the toy manufacturing industry based in the United States founded in the year of 1945. Dora the Explorer, Big Bird, Diego and Elmo are among the popular characters made by Mattel. The company has attained consumer preference over the years owing to its variety of offerings, however in the recent years it had faced one of the organization’s most difficult crises, which has affected it in terms of consumer trust and sustainability. Toy manufacturer Mattel was fined US$2.3 million as civil penalties for the violation of using a “federal lead paint ban”. As a result of this matter, Mattel recalled its popular brands such as Dora, Barbie and other popular branded toys in the year of 2007 (CNN Money, 2009). Toy safety is a kind of regulation based practice by which a regulating body of a country ensures the safety of the kids from the harm generated by using unsafe products. There are certain potential hazards which can cause harm to the kids such as ingestion of the magnetic toys, presence of small parts of the toy, sharp parts of the toy and use of chemical substance. To ensure the product safety, the regulating institutions set different standards which need to be maintained by the toy makers. This is done to eliminate the accidents that can cause injury to the kids. A few of the regulating bodies include the Consumer Product Safety Commission (CPSC), American National Standards Institute (ANSI) and International Organization for Standardization (ISO), Toy Industry Association and International Center for Corporate Accountability (ICCA). By the period of 2000, China had become the leader in the world in respect of toy production. Till the time of 2007, 80 percent of the toys coming to the US were manufactured in China. Mattel produced 65 percent toys in China. One of the primary reasons behind this is definitely cheaper human resources. For the cost minimization perspective, Mattel delivers its most of the demands through the manufacturing head present in China but owing to corruption of a few subcontractors in China it created a major obstacle for the company in terms of its goodwill by a considerable extent. Noticeably, it can be highlighted that Mattel has achieved various awards rendered by a few of the well-known organizations such as World’s Most Ethical Companies 2013 by Ethisphere Institute, Fortune’s 100 Best Companies to Work For and CR Magazine’s 100 Best Corporate Citizens 2012. These recognitions have increased the company’s goodwill (Schmidt, 2008). In this paper, Mattel’s toy safety behaviors and its social responsibilities are going to be addressed in light of the crisis faced by the company due to product recall. Moreover, the steps taken Mattel regarding such scenario would be evaluated. The different roles that can be played by the stakeholders would also be addressed in the paper. Mattel’s Social Responsibility and Ethicalness towards the Safety of Its Toys Mattel has been recognized as one of the most ethical along with socially responsible organizations but in relation to the issue of product recall it violated the child safety norms thus it can be termed guilty and socially irresponsible. Acting Chairman of Consumer Product Safety Commission (CPSC) Thomas Moore stated “This penalty should serve notice to toy makers that CPSC is committed to the safety of children, to reducing their exposure to lead, and to the implementation of the Consumer Product Safety Improvement Act" (CNN Money, 2009). Each and every organization works for its profit and sales maximization. Its motive is to survive in the market but it always needs to maintain certain rules and regulations with regard to its safety of products during its manufacturing process. In the year of 2007, Mattel recalled nearly 20 million Chinese manufactured toys after violating the safety norms. In respect of kid’s toys, people worldwide are less interested towards the use of Chinese made toys. As per the survey done by the Embassy Magazine, 75 percent of the total respondents had unfavorable views towards the Chinese made toys. In order to ascertain whether Mattel acted in a socially responsible and ethical manner or not, there is a need to provide certain illustrations. On violation of toy safety terms it had to recall its toys from various countries (Mattel, Inc, 2013). In 1997, Mattel developed a detailed code of conduct to meet its required standard named Global Manufacturing Principles (GMP). It covers Mattel’s factories, its subcontractors and suppliers and a range of labor issues (Lawrence & Weber, 2011). In an external investigation, it was found that a few of the subcontractors of this company purchased 30 percent cheaper paints from the market as these pains were easier to apply. It was further discovered that one of its Chinese subcontractors named Early Light Industrial used to offer contracts to paint its toys to another company named Hong Li Da, which resulted in the violation regarding the paints. Mattel always prefers it’s incorporate as partners the companies that maintain high ethical standards. The partners of Mattel need to comply with the laws and code of conducts of the countries in which that partner of plant is operating (University of New Mexico, n.d.). Is also ensures that its partners should respect its intellectual property and protect its patent, trademark and copyrights. Its partners need to maintain a superior standard of safety and quality of the toys. Partners must also comply with the import export regulations. Mattel has taken a range of steps to comply with the social responsibility standards. By founding Mattel Children’s Foundation in the year of 1978, it has made a lot of charitable investments for the betterment of the children and their future. By taking initiatives by Mattel Family Learning Program, it included a new building in the Mattel Children’s Hospital. In the year of 1998, it donated gifts worth US$25 million to the UCLA Children’s Hospital. It also has been organizing a lot of voluntary campaigns by donating dollars up to US$5000 annually. Thus, with reference to varied evidences, it can be concluded that Mattel predominantly operates in a socially responsible and ethical manner but it needs to regulate its partners in a more precise and careful manner by ensuring a close watch of its supervision. Mattel mainly recalled its products from the market so that no more children could get affected by the harmful paints. There is no doubt about the fact that this company aims to act in an ethically responsible manner and fulfils the social requirements by donating a sum of money to the charities and for the child education. However, one of the drawbacks of Mattel is its weak monitoring system upon its partner organizations. This factor should be addressed by the company to ensure complete eradication of such major issues in future. Responsibilities Indicating Children’s Exposure to Potentially Dangerous Toys The main responsible authorities for the fact that a lot of children were exposed to potentially dangerous toys are Mattel and its subcontractors. Being a company established in the US, it is not possible for Mattel to supervise all of its partners throughout the globe. For this reason, its respective partners need to take initiatives for preventing fraud in the organization. Despite the best efforts made by Mattel, it’s a few of the overseas manufacturing unites failed to operate faithfully. It had to recall its products from the market after coming under the security of certain reviews owing to use of banned lead paint. As observed earlier, for diminishing the cost of the operations its subcontractors used paints which were easy to apply. This incidence came into the focus of the public and regulating bodies when a European retailer first discovered the use of the lead paint in Mattel toys. At the time of this incidence, 10 million toys were produced in China, which were also affected. In this regard, it can be concluded the main responsible authority for this incidence is Mattel itself. This is because only setting ethical standpoint and various codes of conducts are not sufficient. An organization also needs to follow it up with utmost vigil and monitoring. Parents also need to be quite cautious at the time of purchasing kids products especially toys from the shops (Lawrence & Weber, 2011). Response from Various Groups for Ensuring the Safety of Children’s Toys Toys designed in the United States should conform to the ‘Section 106 of the Consumer Product Safety Improvement Act’ of the year 2008. In the year of 2008, the Consumer Product Safety Improvement Act (CPSIA) was passed in the United States to restrict the amount of use of lead along with phthalates in toys, which may be harmful for the kids below the age of 12. The United States also needs to meet a bunch of standards founded by The American National Standards Institute (ANSI). Contextually, the toy industry in China has been regulating its market since 2007, by including toys in the nation’s certification system. Industries in China also follow rules and regulations maintained by the China Compulsory Certification (CCC) and Certification and Accreditation Administration (CNCA). Toy manufacturers in China also maintain ISO 8124.1:2002 safety regulation which is related with the mechanical and the physical properties (ISO, n.d.). In early 2010, Consumer Product Safety Commission (CPSC) issued a strong message to the parents of the kids stating to remove products or toys from the reach of the kids which can harm them. After this incidence, retailers quickly removed these products from their list of inventories and they insisted on better manufacturing and packaging process which ensure quality products and moreover they insisted on active and fast recall system. After the strict regulation taken by the regulating bodies’, major companies in the toy making industries started withdrawing the products from the market for protracting themselves for not getting penalized. European and global consumer advocates were concerned regarding the matter that the continuous use of toxic materials in the toys would harm the kids to a great extent. The tasks of the consumer advocates were more towards ensuring consumers the aspect of non-availability of the harmful products within the children toys. For this purpose, they shed light on the use of federal regulating system and regular inspection on following this system. A Toy Safety Certification Program was designed by the leading toy manufacturers of the US and by the toy trading industries to ensue that the toys which were manufactured in the US must comply with the Consumer Product Safety Improvement Act (CPSIA). The toy industry also argued that they are manufacturing good products and also they focused on the elimination of the wrongful faulty supply chain system which makes their products harmful by adding harmful chemicals. Governing regulators were mostly interested by the open dialogue between the manufacturing countries. Various standardized organization insisted on the product safety before it reaches the consumers’ hand. Mattel itself had taken a lot of steps to ban the use of toxic chemicals in the children toys (Becker, Edwards & Massey, n.d.). Stakeholder’s Roles to Protect Children from Harmful Toys The best way of society for protecting the children is to raise voices against the guilty organizations, in this scenario Mattel. Another idea for protecting children lies on the parents, for which they should buy the imported products for their kids from a country which maintains the same standards which are maintained by the consumer’s own nation. For example, if safety standards of purchasing country illuminate that the required US based safety standards match with that of the manufacturing country China then only consumers should buy that particular toy. Children can be protected from the harmful toys by ensuring the companies such as Mattel’s fulfillment of the safety norms issued by the regulating bodies. In this regard, government intervention is necessary. The operations of every company should be highly monitored by the government bodies and the organizations should be penalized on being found guilty accordingly. Licensing procedure for setting up a new plant on toy production should be highly scrutinized. Stakeholders’ role in this regard is highly commendable. Stakeholders include customers, governments and investors. To protect children from the harmful toys, a number of parents stopped using those products which were made in China and which included toxic materials such as lead paint. Regulating bodies issued notices to the companies which were found guilty one of them had been Mattel. There is a need for bestowing top priority research towards ascertaining the environmental and physical safety aspects of children from the use of toys. Stakeholders insist on continuous monitoring of the companies and providing awareness to the parents can protect the children from the harmful effects of the toxic chemicals. Stakeholders can raise their power for ensuring safety of the kids. They can create pressure upon any company by completely banning the purchase of their products if it does not meet its safety requirements. Government also can cancel the license of the respective companies if they do not meet the security standards. Society is also a part of the stakeholders, so it can take a stance to improve the quality of a product offered by a company at any given time or remove that particular product from the market. Standardized organizations and regulating bodies should amend or update their current bunch of standards from time to time because industrialization has facilitated in a number of companies to set their new plants in all over the world which needs up-to-date standards to comply with. Law governing bodies should also amend and upgrade the laws relating to the consumer interest and moreover the interests of the children (Becker, Edwards & Massey, n.d.). Conclusion In conclusion, it can be determined that children are the futures of the world, so they should not be harmed for business purposes. In order to ensue that similar uncalled for events do not occur in future various stakeholders including manufacturing companies and regulatory authorities need to ensure strict vigil upon the related activities. This would ensure that that any kind of unwanted materials are not being used by the companies. Moreover, companies also need to ensure that they wisely choose their business partners in their global operations. References Becker, M., Edwards, S., & Massey, R.I., (n.d.). Toxic chemicals in toys and children’s products. Environmental Science & Technology Feature.xxx (xx) CNN Money. (2009). Mattel fined $2.3 million over lead in toys. Retrieved from http://money.cnn.com/2009/06/05/news/companies/cpsc/index.htm?section=money_mostpopular&utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+rss%2Fmoney_mostpopular+%28Most+Popular%29&utm_content=Google+International ISO. (n.d.). Standards catalogue. Retrieved from http://www.iso.org/iso/catalogue_ics_browse?ICS1=97&ICS2=200&ICS3=50&&published=on&development=on&withdrawn=on Lawrence, A.T. & Weber, J. (2011). Business and Society: Stakeholders, Ethics, Public Policy. New York: McGraw-Hill/Irwin. Mattel, Inc. (2013). Corporate Responsibility. Retrieved from http://corporate.mattel.com/about-us/corporate-responsibility.aspx Schmidt, C. W. (2008). Face to Face with Toy Safety: Understanding an Unexpected Threat. Environ Health Perspect. 116(2). University of New Mexico. (n.d.). Mattel responds to ethical challenges. Daniels Fund Ethics Initiative. Read More