This post is WAAAAAY overdue. Guess it’s still sinking in what the new rulings from the CPSC means for our vendors and for us as retailers. So here is our take on the rulings, statements, and hopes surrounding CPSIA. (will we EVER stop talking about this??) The CPSC has come out with a couple of important statements in the past month regarding CPSIA that are causes for mini celebrations and yet, we know both our business and that of many of our suppliers are still effected.  So here are our thoughts on these latest rulings from CPSC:

Rhinestones: We were sad to see the ruling on rhinestones that pretty much has outlawed all childrens crystal bling products. (Sidenote: We didn’t carry many of these products because most were too stereotyping for our philosophy, but there were a few designs that we actually carried and felt were a great alternative to the girly girly bling everywhere. ) With this ruling, the “bling” products that are left just don’t have the same shine, glitter, or well “bling” effect.  It’s quite a disappointment to the many manufacturers and retailers who know these products don’t realistically pose a risk to children. This is in light of our new Director of the CPSC, Inez Tenebaum, upholding the law as written. Such a bitter disappointment and SO frustrating that the CSPC won’t utilize risk based assessments in enforcing this absurd law. There have been many great articles detailling the loss of glitter for children as companies try to struggle to come up with alternatives. See more articles here, here, here, and a great summary here.

Exemptions: For many of our products, this ruling for exemptions is a huge, huge sigh of relief. We support many small crafters that make products from the list of exempted materials including textiles and wood. This is wonderful because ALL of our small vendors producing with these safe products would have had to close their doors without this exemption. This  exemption ruling exempts from third party testing, so our suppliers can continue to produce small batches of SAFE products.  The problem now lies with the manufacturers who make products using exempted products but “alter” them by adding snaps, zippers, and buttons. THESE products are still not exempt even though we KNOW they do not have lead because of XRF testing we did at our location last February:

So that brings us to back to the whole component testing decision that is yet to be made. In this statement, the CPSC does imply/lead us to believe/ provide us a ray of hope that component testing *might* be allowed. Will they just get on with it!! MANY of our suppliers are waiting for the CPSC to decide on component testing so they can make decisions about whether or not they will stay in business after Feb. YES, we are so thrilled for many of our “exempted” products and suppliers but we are still on edge for those who DO use components on their exempted materials. Even products such as screen printed tees and heat transfers are NOT exempt and this will cause a HUGE loss in the industry when many micro businesses will be forced to close without a positive ruling on component testing. So stay tuned.

Tracking Labeling: Ok. Here we go again. On one hand the CPSC provided “guidance” for how manufacturers need to include tracking labels on inventory produced AFTER Aug. 14. That means our inventory we have now is OK and does not need tracking labeling but possibly some of our new inventory for this fall will have to include it. It is all dependent upon when the products were produced. It is my guess that we will see most tracking labels for our spring products are many items are produced at least 6 months in advance (from our bigger manufacturers). With our smaller suppliers, they should be creating their own system to track their products with a labeling system. The CPSC is allowing for room in how this is done by each manufacturer. At least they aren’t regulating that! Our friends over at Organic Baby Farm has come up with a concrete primer to assist small batch manufacturers with this process. This unclear “guidance” has created more questions and after reading the primer from Organic Baby Farm, you’ll see it’s still VERY confusing. This video below also explains just how open-ended this topic is for manufacturers so I”m sure we are just beginning to hear about this aspect of the law.

CSPC Guidance for Tracking Labels Video By Rick Woldenberg.

So for now, we aren’t seeing a lot of tracking labels on our new inventory, but we are trying to make sure everything is in place with big, and small, manufacturers as we move forward.

The Future:  Like every other children’s retailer for baby gifts and children’s clothes, we are waiting to see what is going to happen with the CPSC. There is a lot of speculation that component testing will be allowed or that maybe a risk based assessment will go into effect for testing, or XRF testing will be deemed acceptable.

Another day…another ruling.