Posts about Mattel
(u2acro)
This is an x-ray image. The doll doesn't really look like
this, though it would be kinda cool if it did.
Mattel gushes over the spy-doll:
Budding filmmakers, take note: Barbie® doll now doubles as a video camera! Girls can record and play back clips with this multi-tasking doll, which has a video camera built right in. Capture everything from a doll's-eye-view, then watch it instantly or upload to your computer. There's an LCD screen on Barbie® doll's back, and a camera lens hidden discreetly in her necklace. Talk about making movies in style!More »
—>When the CPSIA—the toy safety law that requires independent lab tests on toys—was passed, a lot of smaller toy manufacturers complained that it was really a dirty trick by the big toy companies to increase overhead for the small ones. Now comes word that the government has secretly exempted Mattel from the law's testing requirements—even though Mattel was responsible for 6 lead-tainted toy recalls in 2007. More »
—>Mattel's revenues are down by 19%. Toy sales from summer movies and flagship product Barbie and Hot Wheels are down. However, the company reported today that profits are way up. So what explains the profits? Blame a visit from Price Hike Barbie. More »
—>Remember back when lead toys were all the rage? Oh, those dangerous days, when you couldn't lick a Dora the Explorer doll without fear of memory loss! Well, Mattel and the Consumer Prouct Safety Commission (CPSC) have reached an agreement on how much Mattel should pay for importing toys that exceeded U.S. lead safety guidelines, and the amount is $2.3 million. Maybe now the CPSC can use some of that money to grease the DC wheels and get their new chair nominee confirmed. More »
Barbie may have to move out of the dream house or whatever — sales are down 9% and Mattel is hurting. [Bizjournals] More »
—>Jeff says his kid's new toy, a working camera from Fisher-Price, tried to give his computer a virus when he plugged it in! More »
—>Just how much lead was in that toy blood pressure cuff Mattel were so reluctant to recall back in February? The one they said "me federal regulations and international consumer product safety standards?" Well, a reader's scientist friend working in lab tested it on the equipment there. According to his results, the amount of lead in the paint was 4-5% lead by weight. "For reference," he writes, "U.S. EPA HUD guidelines set the action limit for paint at 0.5% lead by weight. Any level over 0.5% is considered to be contaminated...Lead paint used on houses 50 years ago had lead content of 2-15%." More »
Sales of Barbie fell 12 percent in the U.S. as the 49-year- old doll faced competition from Hannah Montana and Ganz's Webkinz. Mattel, which recalled more than 21 million Chinese-made products in 2007, expects Chinese manufacturing costs to rise further. The yuan has climbed 10 percent against the dollar over the past 12 months, and inflation in China is near an 11-year high.More »
—>This is Round 16 in our Worst Company in America contest, Mattel vs AT&T.
Mattel profited off of selling millions of toys covered in lead paint, as well a toy with detachable, swallowable, magnet balls. More »
—>56 Members of Congress want to know why Mattel CEO Robert Eckert refuses to issue a nationwide recall for a toy blood-pressure cuff that is contaminated with lead. The affected blood-pressure cuff, sold as part of the Fisher-Price Medical Kit, was recalled exclusively in Illinois after Mattel received a complaint from State Attorney General Lisa Madigan. Legislators want Eckert to stand by a pledge made to reassure a jittery public before the holiday buying season that Mattel would 'earn back our trust with deeds, not just with words.' More »
—>Here's a story that makes you wonder what sort of tools the workers at Mattel's factories use. A "shank" (a blade wrapped in electrical tape, to be exact) was found inside a sealed Polly Pocket toy purchased at Walmart. More »
—>Cadmium batteries are cheap and safe to use, but hazardous to manufacture. They'll save you money—about $1.50 for the average cadmium-powered toy, says the Wall Street Journal. More »
—>Consumer Reports says that Fisher-Price has finished testing another toy blood pressure cuff and have found that it exceeds the Illinois lead limit for toys. More »
—> Yesterday Hasbro launched a new ad campaign in certain newspapers to promote its comparatively stellar safety record with toys—it hasn't had any big ticket items show up in the lead-tainted parade this year (or to the date-rape afterparty) and it wants consumers to know. More »
—>Illinois has tough laws when it comes to dangerous toys, and now Fisher-Price has found itself on the wrong side of the Illinois Lead Poisoning Prevention Act, according to Consumer Reports. More »
—>A survey of global manufacturers found that only 22% have reviewed their supply chain in light of the Mattel lead toy recall situation. Of that number, 1/3 said they would change how they go about evaluating suppliers. 30% said they were sending quality inspectors to overseas plants. Most of the executives said their greatest fear in doing business with China wasn't defective products, but that the Chinese would make knockoffs of their wares. More »
—>Mattel used to manufacture toys in the U.S., specifically in Western New York, where it still has offices. Now Rep. Louise Slaughter is calling for Mattel to repair its reputation by opening a plant in her district.
Slaughter, D-Fairport, made the suggestion to Robert A. Eckert, chairman and chief executive officer of Mattel — Fisher-Price's parent company — in a Nov. 12 phone call. More »
—>Toys R Us has written a reassuring letter to its customers outlining its toy safety policies and threatening to discontinue selling products from any company that ignores them. Since Toys R Us still sells Mattel toys and Thomas & Friends wooden train sets, it's hard to imagine a company that wouldn't make the cut. More »
—> Today Mattel announced a recall of 155,000 Mexican-made toys being sold in countries throughout Europe and the United States. There's no lead contamination this time around; the recall was announced "due to concerns that small pieces could detach from the toys and cause children to choke." The product is the Laugh & Learn Learning Kitchen Toy, part of the Fisher-Price range. More »
—>Mike Antonucci from the Mercury News tells us that Amazon.com has pulled the lead-tainted Fisher-Price Medical Kit from its website after fielding questions about a Consumer Reports investigation that found "troubling" levels of lead in the blood pressure cuff. More »
—>The Consumer's International 2007 International Bad Product Awards are here, folks. Let's have a big round of applause for: More »
—>Consumer Reports is busy testing lead levels in children's toys that are not on any recall list just to see if they are safe. They're nice like that. More »
—>Starting today at 9:30 a.m., the Senate Commerce Committee will examine the lives of the young Chinese workers who assemble our Barbies and Tiggers without the workforce protections or social safety nets enjoyed by western workers. More »
Despite problems involving Chinese-made goods sold in the U.S., a Chinese spokesperson says that orders for Christmas toys are "up" and that factories can't keep up with demand. But he also says, "I urge the importers of Chinese toys to come to China and buy more Chinese toys and I wish children around the world a Merry Christmas," which makes the claim sound like PR spin. [Reuters] More »
—>Mattel's shareholders are upset. A pension fund in Michigan has filed a shareholder lawsuit against the company, claiming that they mishandled product safety procedures and were therefor responsible for 3 toy recalls this summer. The lawsuit also alleges that executives with knowledge of the defects sold $33 million in stock before the recalls were announced. More »
—> Fashion Fever Shopping Boutique, the correctly named Barbie toy, features a built-in credit card swiper and a life-size credit card for young children to use when buying outfits for their dolls. According to the Amazon website, "Once the balance hits zero, it will reset so you can continue to shop." More »
—>The toy recalls are still big news and something (the autumnal equinox, perhaps?) triggered an avalanche of "Oh, no! What should parents do?" advice stories from the media. Most, if not all, mentioned recalls.org,but you can also subscribe to Consumerist's "recalls" feed. More »
—>Here at Consumerist we've been keeping an eye on the 2007 lead contamination recalls. Here's September's update: More »
Mattel takes full responsibility for these recalls and apologises personally to you, the Chinese people and all of our customers who received the toys. It is important for everyone to understand that the vast majority of these products that we recalled were the result of a flaw in Mattel's design, not through a manufacturing flaw in Chinese manufacturers. More »
—>Testifying before congress today, Mattel CEO Robert Eckert demonstrated the size of the aperture it's easier for a camel to pass through than for a lead toy manufacturer to get into heaven. [NYT] More »
—>Today is a big day for Senator Dick Durbin (D-IL). Starting at 11am, the Chairman of the powerful Appropriations Subcommittee on Financial Services and General Government will kick off a series of hearings examining the toy industry's seemingly magnetic attraction to lead paint. Durbin, whose Subcommittee has jurisdiction over the Consumer Product Safety Commission's budget, will grill toy industry representatives, consumer advocates, and members of the government over plans to protect America's children from the dangers silently lurking on toy shelves by establishing an independent testing regime. More »
—>Toy-giant Mattel will recall yet more toys covered in deadly lead-tainted paint, the AP reports. More »
—>Mattel is being investigated (again) by the CPSC over the timeliness of its latest batch of recalls. According to the WSJ, Mattel knows it is required to inform the agency within 24 hours of receiving information about a defect that could cause injury—it just doesn't do it because it thinks its not fair. More »
Eighty-five percent of the roughly 20 mln toys that Mattel recalled were due to design faults, Li, the director of the General Administration of Quality Supervision, Inspection and Quarantine, told reporters. More »
The El Segundo, Calif., toy maker sued Global China Networks LLC in federal court in Manhattan on Tuesday over its Web site, www.chinabarbie.com. Global is a limited liability company organized in Florida and maintains a post-office box in New York, according to the complaint. More »
—>A lawsuit filed Monday asks Mattel to pay for lead testing to determine if children have been exposed to lead from the millions of recalled toys. More »
—>Mattel CEO Bob Eckert posted a video apology for the millions of lead-tainted and faulty magnet toys they were forced to recall. In it, he apologizes, has himself and his company take full responsibility for the issue, and outlines specific new steps to insure product quality and step up inspection processes. This is the best corporate apology video we've ever seen. More »
—>Today Mattel expanded their lead paint recall to include 253,000 die cast "Cars" toys. In addition, Mattel expended a 2006 magnetic toy recall to include about 7 million other toys. More »
—>Mattel is probably going to take another toy off the shelves due to overleaded paint, reports the AP and a tipster. The announcement of which toy could come today. More »
—>The owner of a Chinese toy factory identified by Mattel as the maker of the lead-tainted toys involved in a million unit recall committed suicide Saturday afternoon inside his factory, according to Chinese officials, the AP reports. According to the article, dishonored officials commonly commit suicide. More »
—>China's General Administration for Quality Supervision, Inspection and Quarantine (GAQSIQ) blamed Mattel for the recent lead contamination of nearly 1 million toys, saying that the toy maker did not adequately supervise their suppliers. Mattel's oversight safeguards are widely regarded as the "gold standard" for manufacturing in China. From the LA Times: More »
—> Chinese officials have announced that they will "severely" punish the vendors responsible for the recent lead-tainted toy snafu. That leads us to ask, what do they consider severe punishment? Remember what they did to the director of the food and drug agency for accepting poisoned toothpaste bribes? And the new state-sponsored video game "Incorruptible Fighter", where players get to execute corrupt officials with magic or weapons, is so popular that it's been downloaded over 100,000 times. More »
—>Mattel is blaming a potentially bankrupt cardboard box vendor for supplying 967,000 toys covered with lead paint. The toy maker publicly identified the Lee Der Industrial Company in Guangdong province in the hopes that other toy makers will take their business elsewhere. The AP tried to call Lee Der for comment, which resulted in this odd exchange: More »
—>Two weeks before announcing the recall of nearly 1 million toys tainted with toxic lead paint, Mattel was featured in the New York Times as a role model, the "gold standard" for companies manufacturing goods in China. The Chinese Poison Train's ability to sneak past Mattel's fortified defenses highlights the tremendous difficulties faced by well-meaning American manufacturers trying to police their supply chains. Mattel spared no expense to ensure the safety of their products. More »
—>Sorry kids, the Consumer Product Safety Commission and Fisher-Price are recalling Big Bird, Elmo, Dora and 83 other types of fun toys that happen to be covered with toxic lead paint from China. More »
Gross sales of its Barbie line rose 3 percent domestically and worldwide during the quarter. More »
—>Well, well, well. Who knew Ariel was a prude? Apparently, if you press the button on the talking Ariel fast enough, the toy cycles through such saccharine phrases as "Life is the bubbles" quickly enough that a secret message is revealed. "You're a slut!" More »
—>Mattel is recalling 2.4 million Polly Pocket play sets due to several serious injuries sustained when magnets inside the dolls and accessories fell out undetected. More »
My 11 year old, cute-as-a-button cousin Lilly writes in: More »
—>For this post, we knew exactly what image we were looking for: an image of Barbie — barefoot and flanked by Ken and two of Barbie's pan-ethnic plastic girlfriends — sashaying with shopping bags right across Abbey Road. Unfortunately, that image doesn't exist, and we're too stupid to make it. So instead, we've been forced to illustrate it with this image of a murdered Barbie, her head crushed by a Volkwagen sized aluminum can. Serves her right, the cocktease. More »
—>Over at the Bleat, James Lileks took time out of talking about how great the olden days are to illustrate that, though we live in an age of Hooker Barbies, it's not like they just started being offensive. More »
Like a tired brand getting a face lift, the revelation that Mattel will trot a line of 50's inspired Barbie dolls prompted Farkers to Botox another trope, the inapropropriate occupation Barbie. More »
—>Lil Miss Rodeo is the least of [insert the name a potentially concerned party here]'s worries about the new line of Barbie pinup dolls. How about French Maid Barbie? More »
—>Mattel has announced that every ten year old boy's secret plastic girlfriend, Barbie, is finally going 50's sexpot. The lascivious, long legged tramp is getting her own "Pin-Up" line of dolls, inspired by the fifty year old cheesecake calendars still mustily crumbling upon the wall of our grandfathers' garages. More »
