Ten Ways to Protect Your Clients and Build Your Business

July 30, 2013 ~ Rick Brenner ~ Leave a comment

When you consult with your customers about their promotions or inquire of your suppliers about their products, do you ask questions about product safety and compliance? For your customer – Who will the products be given to? Where will they be distributed? For your supplier – What third-party tests have been performed for these products? If you’re not asking basic questions like these, you’re missing valuable opportunities to distinguish yourself from your competitors. More importantly, you could be putting your customers, your distributorship, your suppliers and even the industry at risk. Yet, putting yourself in a position where you are confident enough to ask the right questions that will protect everyone in the supply chain is a cinch for promotional products professionals. Here’s a list of ten guidelines that that every responsible member of the industry should master.

Learn the basic product safety laws and regulations that affect the promotional products industry. The main one is CPSIA, an acronym for the Consumer Product Safety Improvement Act. It’s the federal law that regulates children’s products and toys. If one of your clients has a promotion that involves young children, you must understand how CPSIA applies and what you must verify with your supplier to ensure compliance. There are other federal laws to consider as well, such as those that apply to industry products that come into contact with food, like water bottles, tumblers, coolers and lunch bags. Together with hand sanitizer, sunglasses, and first aid kits, these promotional items are governed by U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) regulations. Certain states have regulations as well, such as California’s Proposition 65 and Illinois’ lead law. There are industry resources to help you learn these basics – educational sessions at industry events and webinars through trade associations to name a few. You don’t need to know all the technicalities of these laws but you do need to know enough to ask the right questions so you can make informed decisions. A few hours of product safety training is a great start.

Know your products. If you’re a supplier, you should know everything you can about each product in your line. Importers and manufacturers should have technical drawings, a bill of materials (BOM) and performance requirements for each of their products. These documents comprise the basis of quality control and compliance testing. Suppliers should perform risk analyses and use and abuse testing when evaluating new products. Are the products suitable for children? What ages? Distributors should ask related questions when selecting products from suppliers. Has the product been tested by a third-party lab? Which tests have been conducted? Does it comply with each state’s safety laws? What age is it designed for? Is it a child’s toy? The more we know about the products we sell the better job we do to protect our clients.

Know your suppliers. How much do you really know about each of your suppliers? You can learn a lot from a catalog and website but marketing materials don’t tell you the extent of what goes on behind the scenes. Does the supplier have a knowledgeable head of compliance? How does the supplier evaluate new products and vet its factories? What third-party tests does the supplier commission, how often and for which products? Does the supplier have an XRF instrument to test products in-house? What about ink testing? Are some or all of the supplier’s products compliant as children’s products? What is the supplier’s policy on Prop 65 compliance? How will you be indemnified? These are only examples of the kinds of questions you should be asking each of your suppliers in addition to visiting their headquarters and seeing their operations first hand.

Know your clients. Each of your clients is unique. Learn about their differences so you can meet their specific requirements and expectations. Some companies have testing requirements that exceed applicable regulations. Others have written social accountability policies for any factory producing a product with their logo. Companies differ in risk tolerance and rely on you to guide them. Case in point: Federal law permits general use products to be sold for use by young children even if the products are not tested, not certified, and even if they contain more lead than allowed for children’s products. But how would your client feel about handing out a product to children that doesn’t meet children’s product standards? The more you know about each client’s policies and expectations, the better job you can do to meet their individual needs.

Know the intended audience. When you speak to a client about a promotion, always ask about the target audience – who the products are intended for – and the U.S. states where the products will be distributed. If the target audience includes children, this should influence your product selection. Children’s products and toys must meet stringent lead and phthalate requirements, be certified by a third-party lab and carry permanent tracking labels. Certain U.S. states have additional requirements. Illinois, for example, has a lead law that exceeds the federal standard. A best practice for distributors is to highlight on purchase orders to suppliers whether the products are for children and where the products will be distributed. This will help your supplier verify that your products will be compliant with all applicable regulations.

Know the risks. Risk is inherent in all that we do whether we are trying a restaurant for the first time, taking advantage of a bargain price, or selecting products blindly from a catalog. In the promotional products industry, there are product safety risks (will the product hurt anyone), regulatory compliance risks (does the product comply with applicable laws and safety standards), and social accountability risks (could the manufacturing of the product embarrass your client), among others. No matter what you do, no matter how careful you are, no one can eliminate risk entirely. Even the most prestigious brands have product failures, recalls and production gaffes. But you can mitigate risk to a great degree by being aware of risks and making appropriate product and supplier decisions. Your clients put their most valuable asset in your care—their name and logo—when they entrust you to select the products that will bear that name. Treat this responsibility with the care and diligence it deserves. Brand protection is one of your most sacred responsibilities.

Educate the team. For most distributors and suppliers, servicing major customers requires a well-organized team effort. Unless everyone on the team is on the same page, it isn’t likely that you will deliver consistent service, let alone excel. The same principal applies to product safety and compliance. The quality of your safety and compliance initiatives will only be as strong as the weakest link. Take the time to educate everyone on your team in the basics of responsible sourcing.

Stay current. Even though the Consumer Products Safety Improvement Act (CPSIA) became effective in August 2008, many of its provisions were phased in gradually and some became progressively more stringent. At first, third party testing was not required and later it became mandatory. Originally 600 parts per million (ppm) was the maximum lead allowed in children’s products, then 300 ppm and now 100 ppm. In addition to phase in rules, the U.S. Consumer Products Safety Commission (CPSC) continually develops new rules that either modify existing regulations or introduce new ones altogether. For example, CPSC is currently developing a rulemaking to establish a new federal standard for small, powerful magnet sets which have been sold in the promotional industry as puzzles, sculptures and stress relievers. To help stay current about CPSC changes, go to http://www.cpsc.gov and sign up for email alerts about rule changes, recalls and other product safety news. And, in addition to CPSC, there are other federal and state laws to stay abreast of. For updated news on the entire range of product safety regulation affecting the industry, trade associations and testing labs can be great sources of information.

Instill a Product Safety Culture. Imagine that one day you decide to start eating nothing but 100% organically grown food. Think of the challenges you would have at least three times a day for the rest of your life. What are you going to eat? Where are you going to buy your food? Where does that food come from? How is it grown? How can you be sure? Solve that problem for breakfast today and it starts over again at lunch. Whatever you might have done yesterday to ensure your food supply when you were in Chicago won’t help you at all tomorrow when you’re off to New York. For you to be successful in this new eating habit, planning in advance for the organic food you are going to eat each day and where you are going to obtain it reliably will have to become second nature, as if it were embedded in your DNA. And so it is with product safety and compliance. The kinds of food and ingredient questions you would have to ask every day if you drastically changed your eating habits are the same kinds of questions you should be asking every day to ensure safe and compliant product. What’s in this product? Who is going to use it? Where will it be distributed? How carefully was it made? What was it tested for? Was this shipment tested? How can I be sure? Ensuring safe and compliant product is a daily journey, not a destination. Just like my food example, it requires continuous vigilance and attention, order by order, promotion by promotion.

The more that product safety and compliance becomes second nature and an automatic consideration no matter what client or promotion you’re working on, the more you’ll protect your clients, protect your business and ultimately protect the industry, a responsibility we all have to each other.

This article is scheduled for the October 2013 issue of Wearables Magazine

For Promotional Product Sales, Protect Your Client’s Brand

May 29, 2013 ~ Rick Brenner ~ Leave a comment

Whether you are selling to a global brand like Nike or to your local YMCA, no single asset is more valuable to your client than the client’s good name. Sell them a promotional product that enhances their brand and you’re likely to have a happy customer for a long time. Sell a product that embarrasses the brand and the cost for everyone involved could be astronomical.

Consider a case involving the Winn Dixie and Publix grocery chains. In November 2010 investigative reporters from the Tampa Tribune purchased about two dozen reusable grocery bags and sent them to a lab to test whether or not the bags contained lead and other toxic metals. Some of the bags tested high for lead so the newspaper featured the story in its Sunday edition that week. Instantly the story went viral on the Internet and became the headline story on news broadcasts nationwide all weekend. The lead discovered in these bags was relatively low – less than 200 parts per million – and product safety lawyers struggled to find any regulation that had been violated, but none of that mattered. The story alone was damage enough. By Monday morning, Senator Charles Schumer of New York was on the floor of the U.S. Senate demanding that the FDA ban all reusable grocery bags containing lead. “When our families go to the grocery store looking for safe and healthy foods to feed their kids, the last thing they should have to worry about are toxic bags,” said Schumer. Both grocery chains, and eventually several others, announced nationwide recalls. Aside from the millions of dollars in recall costs, damage to the reputation of these brands was enormous. For these grocery chains, all of their efforts to reinforce a “you can trust us” message was undone in one weekend.

The reusable grocery bag story is significant but not unusual. For better or for worse, ever since the millions of Chinese-made Barbie dolls were recalled for lead paint violations in what has become known as the Summer of Recalls – August 2007 – the promotional products industry has had to deal with a new reality – the world of product safety, regulatory compliance and responsible sourcing.

So how do you embrace this new reality? Where do you get started and how do you make it part of your culture?

The first and most important step is education. Learn the basic product safety regulations and how they apply in our industry. The most comprehensive federal law is the Consumer Product Safety Improvement Act (CPSIA). It was enacted in August 2008 and imposes strict lead limits for all children’s products and additional requirements for toys. Much has been written about how to determine whether the product you’re selling is regarded as a children’s product. The distinction is not always a bright line and even experts sometimes disagree. Why does it matter? In addition to the lead restrictions, children’s products require third party testing, permanent tracking labels and certificates specifying when and where the product was manufactured and tested. For everyone’s sake – your client, your company and the industry – I recommend a simple rule of thumb: If the intended audience of a promotion includes children, protect everyone involved. Don’t let yourself get sucked into a debate of whether the item is a children’s product or a general use product. For these promotions play it safe and select products that have been produced and tested to CPSIA children’s product standards.

One difficult challenge for the promotional products industry is that many products become children’s products only after they are decorated. Most blank water bottles, for example, are considered “general use” and not subject to CPSIA. But if a water bottle is imprinted with a juvenile logo – such as a Winnie-the-Pooh type of character that appeals primarily to young children – it is transformed into a children’s product and becomes subject to the entire suite of children’s product rules. The same applies to string backpacks and a host of other similar products. Some suppliers will note on their websites the “child-friendly” products for which they have third-party testing. Other suppliers have CPSIA test reports for all of their products. Speak to your suppliers to learn each one’s protocol for children’s products. Complying with the law is a partnership and requires open communication between distributor and supplier. You should know which of your supplier’s blank products are “children’s product” compliant just as your supplier should be told when the intended audience for your promotion includes children. To learn if the intended audience includes children make this a standard question you ask your clients for every order. In addition to obtaining the information you need to comply with the law, it’s an opportunity to demonstrate to your client your concern for their protection and your knowledge of the law. In communicating this information to your suppliers, make it your standard practice to note it on applicable purchase orders in bold letters: The products in this order are intended for an audience that includes children 12 years of age or younger and must comply with all provisions of CPSIA!

Speaking of promotional products suppliers, with product safety and regulatory compliance in mind you should vet each of your suppliers carefully and perhaps through a different lens than you have before. Does the supplier have a compliance department? Is there a senior compliance officer who can explain to you how the compliance process works at each of the suppliers’ factories and at their headquarters? Does the supplier have any quality or product safety certifications? Do they have inspection records and third-party audits to back up what they’re saying? Is a risk assessment done on their products before each one is added to the line? What third- party tests are conducted and how often? How do you obtain the current test report for each product? Do the test reports include photographs specific to the supplier’s products or are they generic reports for similar products made by the same factory? Does the report include all the required tests to comply with U.S. regulations or is the report referring to European standards? All of these are important questions that you or someone in your organization should know the answers to before doing business with any supplier.

Where can you get this education if you’re new to product safety? One great resource is the Promotional Products Association International (PPAI). PPAI frequently offers product safety classes and has an extensive library of on-demand product safety webinars. It also publishes numerous best practices documents that can help jumpstart your compliance initiative. PPAI even has an online tool called Turbo Test that walks you through a series of questions to help you determine the compliance requirements for most promotional products. Testing labs such as UL-STR and Anseco are another resource for product safety and compliance training. Most labs provide webinars on a variety of product safety and compliance topics and provide consulting services on a product-by-product basis as well.

Like any topic you’ve ever studied, product safety for the promotional industry will take some time to learn. But if you make the investment in time, you can be certain that it will pay handsome dividends for your career. When you learn to ask the questions that make it obvious to your client you are just as committed to protecting their name as to making a sale – that you are acting as a fiduciary for their brand – you will enjoy a different relationship than before. Instead of being regarded as the promotional products sales rep, you will become a valued and trusted advisor to the client, the highest mark of respect you can earn.

References:

http://www2.tbo.com/business/breaking-news-business/2010/nov/11/coming-sunday-does-your-grocery-bag-contain-toxic–ar-16265/

http://www2.tbo.com/business/breaking-news-business/2010/nov/14/lead-taints-reusable-bags-ar-15400/

http://www.examiner.com/article/walgreens-and-safeway-recall-reusable-grocery-bags

http://www.consumerfreedom.com/downloads/ccf_bag_report.pdf

http://www.schumer.senate.gov/new_website/record.cfm?id=328640

NOTE: This article by Rick Brenner originally appeared in the February 2013 issue of Print + Promo Magazine.

CPSC General Counsel Clarifies Distributor Responsibilities for Children’s Apparel

October 5, 2012 ~ Rick Brenner ~ Leave a comment

Ever since the early years of our industry there aren’t many promotional products distributors who would describe themselves as manufacturers. But under the Consumer Product Safety Improvement Act (CPSIA), the majority of promotional products distributors –at least those who buy blank apparel from a wholesaler and then send it out to have it decorated—are just that, manufacturers in the eyes of the law. Now for the first time, as a follow-up to questions posed at PPAI’s Product Safety Summit this past August in New Orleans, the General Counsel of the U.S. Consumer Products Safety Commission (CPSC) has put in writing exactly how the senior staff at the Commission regards the responsibilities of distributors who decorate. This written guidance doesn’t change anything from the Commission’s perspective but it might surprise many distributors to learn of the extent of their responsibilities under the law.

The issue we’re discussing is related to children’s apparel – tee shirts, baseball uniforms or sweat shirts, among others – and the amount of lead that might become part of these garments through the inks or other surface coating materials that are used in the decoration process. Current law limits this lead content to no more than 90 parts per million (ppm) for any “articles intended for use by children.”

So how does a distributor become a manufacturer when they don’t manufacture the garment? According to discussions with the Commission, the original manufacturer of the garment is responsible for compliance of the garment as they sell it, whether blank or decorated. If it is a children’s product – often obvious with apparel because of children’s sizes – the garment manufacturer must comply with all the provisions of CPSIA for lead in the substrate of the product (100 ppm) and lead in any paint or surface coating (90 ppm). This manufacturer must include a permanent tracking label on the garment as well.

But according to a 2009 meeting between PPAI and CPSC, the Commission has made clear that if a promotional products distributor buys a blank and compliant garment and then performs an operation that transforms the garment in any way before the garment is sold to the end buyer, then that distributor is responsible as a manufacturer for whatever “transforming” operation it may have performed itself or contracted to have done – such as tie-dyeing, stain proofing, embroidering, adding a press-on applique or simply silk screening the garment. The distributor’s “manufacturer” responsibilities include obtaining a test from a CPSC approved third party laboratory confirming the lead content of the surface coating and applying a permanent tracking label to the garment to cover the decoration. This tracking label is in addition to any tracking label that may have been applied by the blank garment manufacturer such as Gildan, Hanes or Champion.

Some promotional products distributors have wondered why they should be held responsible for ink applied by their decorator. We posed this question to Ms. Falvey who explained that the responsible party depends on how the transaction is structured between the distributor and the decorator. If a decorator buys a blank garment from an apparel wholesaler, decorates it and then sells the final decorated product to a distributor, then the decorator is responsible as the manufacturer. But if a distributor buys a blank garment from an apparel wholesaler and then sends it to a decorator to be personalized, the distributor is the manufacturer. The decorator in the latter case is simply a subcontractor to the distributor.

So what is the new guidance that Ms. Falvey has written to help distributor “manufacturers” understand their obligations under CPSIA? It has to do with third party testing and the extent of the distributors’ responsibility to verify that their decorator is using compliant ink. A question was posed to Ms. Falvey as to whether or not a distributor could rely on a decorator’s certification that their inks were compliant without having to personally test the inks or the finished garments, as long as the decorator indicated that the inks were tested once per year.

Ms. Falvey writes: “The short answer to that question is yes. The certificate from the imprinter (or firm applying the ink) can cover multiple batches or lots of production. The only caveat is that the firm selling the imprinted item (distributor) must have exercised an appropriate level of due care to ensure that the ink being used by the imprinter is the same that is covered in the certificate such that each additional batch or lot of production will continue to comply with all applicable children’s product safety rules.”

For promotional products distributors, the CPSC guidance is a bit of a good news/bad news scenario. The good news is that distributors can rely on a decorator’s certification without having to test every garment order at a third party lab. The bad news is that the Commission has set a very high bar of responsibility for the distributor to independently verify that the inks that the decorator is using for every order are the same as what is covered by the certificate and that each additional batch is compliant as well. Each distributor will have to determine how to fulfill these responsibilities but it is clear that the distributor will have to go far beyond keeping a current certificate on file. If a recall or non-compliant garment issue arises, Ms. Falvey’s letter makes clear that the distributor will need to prove to the Commission that it exercised “an appropriate level of due care.”

From a common sense perspective, a distributor could and should visit their decorators periodically, learn about their ink procurement and testing procedures, review their third-party test documentation and do whatever they would normally do if they had their own factory or decorating operation to ensure that the operation is compliant. If a distributor does not want to do this, or doesn’t have the expertise, he or she should discuss with their legal counsel whether or not it is worth the risk to continue to be responsible for decorating children’s apparel. There is already one case in the past few months of a John Deere tee shirt recall in Canada for high lead in the decoration. Recalls are very expensive not to speak of other costs and penalties possible under CPSIA. In addition, ink is only one of the materials that may need to be tested. If the decoration involves an applique, the glue and other material in the applique must also be third party tested as it all constitutes a surface coating.

Another strategy is for distributors to continue to sell children’s apparel but to purchase it as a finished product from a compliant apparel decorator. Distributors would still want to exercise due diligence that the decorator is compliant – just as they would in purchasing children’s products from any supplier – but they wouldn’t have the manufacturer’s responsibility under CPSIA for testing and tracking labels.

Finally, as with all regulatory matters, in addition to the practical and common sense aspects, the matters discussed in Ms. Falvey’s letter are legal issues and I am not a lawyer. Nothing that I have written in this or any other article should be construed as legal advice. All industry participants – suppliers and distributors – would be well served by consulting with a product safety attorney who regularly practices before the Consumer Product Safety Commission and is an expert in CPSIA matters.

Falvey Letter Re Decorating and Tracking Labels

Updated Toy Safety Standard takes Effect June 12. New Tests Required!

June 11, 2012 ~ Rick Brenner ~ Leave a comment

If you import children’s toys, or if you’re a promotional products supplier with children’s toys in your line, effective tomorrow you’ll need to comply with an update to the mandatory Federal Toy Safety Standard. Among other changes, this revision (ASTM F963-11) adds limits for the soluble amount of eight metals (antimony, arsenic, lead, barium, cadmium, chromium, mercury, and selenium) permitted in toy substrates. The change is effective for toys manufactured or imported after June 12, 2012 for children 14 years of age or younger.

The ASTM F963 Toy Safety Standard used to be voluntary. But in 2008, the Consumer Product Safety Improvement Act (CPSIA) made ASTM F963 a mandatory standard. At that time, the current version of the Toy Safety Standard was F963‑07 with the “07” signifying the year that the latest revision was adopted. Since then, CPSC has voted to adopt two newer revisions – one issued in 2008 and the latest in December 2011. In February 2012, the Commission announced in the Federal Register its decision to adopt ASTM F963-11 effective as of June 12, 2012.

For the moment, the law requires you to comply with every provision of the new standard – including the 2011 changes – but doesn’t require you to use a CPSC certified third-party lab to test for the 2011 changes. The reason is that the Commission has not yet voted to adopt recently proposed rules for third party laboratories which it published in the Federal Register on May 24, 2012. Comments on these proposed rules are not due until August 7, 2012.

If you have another reliable way to verify compliance for the F963-11 changes—perhaps by testing with an XRF instrument—you could avoid, until CPSC adopts the new rules, the cost of testing the 2011 updates at a third-party lab. However, this waiver only applies to the F963-11 changes. You’ll still need a test from a CPSC certified third-party laboratory for the portions of ASTM F963-11 that are “functionally equivalent” to F963-08.

The risk of third-party testing now for the new requirements of F963-11 is that when the proposed rules are finally adopted by CPSC, the lab you choose may not be accredited for the new requirements and you will have to retest at an approved lab. In my opinion, this is a very minor risk compared to the risk of not having an independent test confirming that your toy complies with the new requirements.

CPSC addressed this in an FAQ on its website:

In the event that a manufacturer or importer wishes to have its products tested now – in the hope that testing to the -11 version eventually will be accepted by the CPSC – that manufacturer or importer should check with its current CPSC-accepted laboratory to see if they will be applying to the CPSC for acceptance of the -11 version. If so, and if the lab satisfies other conditions spelled out in the draft document, then the Commission likely will accept that testing upon its approval of the new Notice of Requirements. (This is not a guarantee of the Commission’s action, but the Commission traditionally has permitted acceptance of such testing, provided that all the other conditions are satisfied.)

It’s always a treacherous scenario in our industry when the law requires strict compliance with a set of standards but doesn’t require third-party testing. For one thing, it places an extra burden on distributors – to verify that the toys they’re purchasing are compliant with the new standard if the supplier or factory does not have a third party lab report verifying compliance.

My advice is to not buy any toy that is imported or manufactured after June 12, 2012 unless you get a report from well-known third-party laboratory verifying compliance with all the provisions of ASTM F963-11.

For promotional products distributors who maintain test reports in their files of children’s toys they order frequently, or for those who have children’s toys in company stores or in other co-op programs, be sure to go back to your supplier for an updated test report.

The full text of the FAQ from the CPSC website can be found at http://www.cpsc.gov/info/toysafety/plain.html

Loopholes in Product Safety Law Put Compliance Burden on You

January 30, 2012 ~ Rick Brenner ~ Leave a comment

You sell a product to a Little League for distribution to seven year olds. Would your client expect the product to comply with Federal children’s product standards?

The answer, I suspect, is a resounding “yes” just as you would expect the toys you buy for your own kids to be able to pass the Federal Toy Safety Standard and the food you purchase to be able to pass FDA food standards.

Unfortunately for the promotional products industry, things are not that simple. The Consumer Product Safety Improvement Act (CPSIA) – the Federal law that governs children’s products – includes a basic definition for children’s products that is ambiguous at best. The agency that enforces this Act, the Consumer Products Safety Commission (CPSC), came up with an enhanced definition that introduces new issues as it tries to clarify the original. Take the case of a simple water bottle destined for a second grade Little League team. If the name of the team is imprinted in a plain type style the bottle is considered a general use item – not a children’s product – because CPSC says it appeals to all ages including the 7 year old Little Leaguers. Most importantly, general use items don’t have to comply with children’s product standards. But the identical water bottle decorated with a Winnie the Pooh type character – something that would only appeal to the young children – is considered a children’s product and has to comply with the CPSIA standards. Same bottle. Same kids. Different decoration. One has to comply, one doesn’t.

Say that your order was for the plain type version – the one that doesn’t have to comply with CPSIA. And say that the plastic lid of the bottle you sell the Little League happens to contain 1,000 parts per million (ppm) of lead – 10 times the CPSIA limit for children’s products. Now imagine that some consumer advocacy group gets hold of one of those bottles, tests it and then tells the league it intends to send a press release to the media that Little League is distributing lead-laden bottles to seven year olds. Do you think the league administrators or the parents would be comforted or placated by your explanation that the product is a general use item that doesn’t have to comply with children’s product standards? Not likely.

One reason for these challenges in our industry is that most promotional products are not “children’s products” as blank, undecorated products. Non-children’s blanks only become children’s products if they are decorated with a juvenile design and even then only if the products are “mainly” for children 12 and under and have declining appeal to older kids.

Suppliers deal with this blanks-that-could-become-children’s-products challenge individually. Some test all of their products to children’s product standards, some indicate on their websites the specific products which have been tested and for some you may have to make a call to find out which products are compliant and have been tested. The most important point is that the burden is on you to find this information out before you place your order, to avoid selecting a product which has not been tested as compliant.

In summary, when kids are part of the audience for the products you sell, my advice is to ignore the loopholes in CPSIA and insist on choosing products that have been tested by a third party lab as compliant with children’s product regulations. Just keep reminding yourself, “If children are involved, would my client expect the products I’m recommending to have been tested to children’s product standards?” Let that be your guide and you’ll never go wrong.

Time to Take a Closer Look at the Test Reports in Your Files

November 14, 2011 ~ Rick Brenner ~ Leave a comment

With the deadline for mandatory third party lead testing less than two months away, now would be a very good time to take a closer look at the third-party test reports in your files. There’s a good chance that upon closer inspection you might find that for certain products the reports you’re relying on for compliance might not be very reliable.

In the Consumer Products Safety Improvement Act (CPSIA), Congress mandated that an accredited third party laboratory must test children’s products before they can be distributed in commerce. Testing for lead in paint or surface coating has been required since December of 2008. Testing for lead in substrate will take effect on January 1, 2012.

So what are the reliability concerns I’m raising?

While some question the accuracy of the tests – by showing inconsistent results from one lab to the next—that isn’t the issue I see. My concern is more serious—that some of the test reports you receive may not even be for the same product that you’re selling. In those cases, the reports are not reliable and provide a false sense of security to you and to your customers.

Here’s one way that happens: Instead of ordering tests for their own products, U.S. importers often turn to their overseas factories for testing. But some of these factories—particularly ones that supply similar versions of their products to multiple customers in the US—may try to mitigate the cost by testing only a small subset of their products—sometimes only one SKU out of a varied line of products. Instead of testing the actual products as produced for each of their customers, they send a generic version of their product to a lab and then they give these test results to every customer who requests a test report. I’ve seen tests like this more times than I can count.

So what’s the problem with this practice?

Well, there’s no problem with a U.S. importer having their overseas factory order the testing from an accredited lab as long as the tested version of the product is exactly the same in all material respects as the product they’re selling—same item, same finish, same color, same trim, same design, same paint and substrate materials, same raw material supplier, and the same factory. But that’s often not the case.

The more common scenario is that the generic version is similar but different from your product. It might be a different material or color, have different trim details or include additional features from the generic version. Any of these differences requires a separate third party test.

Another possibility is that the report you have is for a completely different product from yours. Overseas factories don’t always test every product they produce. I’ve seen cases where a factory will respond to a test request by sending any report they have in their files. Unless the US firm receiving the report is trained in what to look for, these reports are often accepted as is and passed along to customers.

So how can you tell if your report is really for your product?

Is the product named in the report exactly the same way as it is listed on the web or in the catalog where you found it? If your product is a Bonzo HT-341 in midnight blue, does the test report say Bonzo HT-341 in midnight blue? Be wary of reports with generic product descriptions like “Plastic Bottle” or “Tote Bag” and few product details.
Does the test report include a picture of the product? Is the picture exactly the same as your product and does it include your color? The best test reports include detailed photographs of the actual products tested.
Look for the name of the company who ordered the test. Is it the same as the company you are buying the product from or is it a company you’ve never heard of? There’s no problem with tests ordered by overseas factories if they’re for your actual product but be wary of reports ordered by factories for generic versions of their products.

These tips are just a few of the basics in evaluating test reports. I’ve listed several others in my September 30^th article If You Sell Promotional Products, Learn to Read a Test Report. And if you’re a PPAI member, check out the November 2^nd webinar entitled How to Read a Test Report. It is archived on PPAI’s website.

Test reports are an important part of your due diligence to ensure that the products you’re selling comply with applicable law. Your customers are relying on the integrity of the reports you provide. Take this opportunity to go through your files to verify that you have current test reports for the products you’re selling and that the reports really are for your specific products.

Distributor to Supplier: Is this Product OK for Children?

October 24, 2011 ~ Rick Brenner ~ Leave a comment

I received a call last week from a distributor concerned about an order she had recently shipped through an industry supplier for a children’s event. The distributor told me she had inquired of the supplier’s customer service rep if the product was OK for children but was now wondering what else she should have done. Here is a capsule of what I recommended.

Start by asking for the product’s General Certification of Conformity (GCC) as well as its most recent test reports. A GCC is required by federal law for every consumer product subject to any rule or regulation enforced by CPSC. Regardless of what the test report says, the GCC is the best way to find out if the supplier considers the product as a “children’s product.” If the supplier does not, even if the test report passes CPSIA standards, it is a red flag that the supplier might not be monitoring each production run to children’s product standards.

Recommendation 1 (Children’s Product): If you sell a product that you know is intended for children, be sure that the supplier acknowledges through the GCC that it is a children’s product. Then, if something goes wrong later, you won’t risk being in the position of the supplier saying “we didn’t know it was for children and we never said it was a children’s product.”

So how do you find out from the GCC if the supplier considers the product a “children’s product?” You do so by examining the section of the GCC listing the applicable regulations. CPSIA requires the importer or domestic manufacturer to list every CPSC-enforced rule that applies to the product. If the supplier doesn’t have a GCC for the product, or if the section noting the applicable rules is blank, it means that the supplier is not acknowledging that the product is a children’s product or a children’s toy.

If the item is certified for use as a children’s product you will see at least two rules listed. The first is CPSIA lead-in-substrate, sometimes called total lead. The second is lead-in-surface coating, sometimes called 16 CFR 1303. Lead in substrate refers to lead in the material that the product is made of. Lead in surface coating refers to lead in any painted surfaces or in the imprint.

If the item is certified as a children’s toy you will see at least two more rules in addition to the two lead provisions. One is the mandatory toy safety standard called ASTM F963. That used to be a voluntary standard but Congress made it mandatory when they passed the Consumer Product Safety Improvement Act (CPSIA). The second toy related rule applies to chemicals referred to as “phthalates.” CPSIA prohibits the sale of children’s toys with concentrations of more than .1% of any of the phthalates DEHP, DBP, BBP, DINP, DIDP and DnOP.

Recommendation 2 (Children’s Toy): Same concept as recommendation 1. If you sell a product that you know is likely to be used a children’s toy, be sure the supplier acknowledges through the GCC that it is a children’s toy.

The GCC requires other information you should note as well. First, make sure that the product identified on the GCC is exactly the same as they one you’re buying. Second, look for the name of the U.S. importer or domestic manufacturer certifying compliance of the product. Is it the name of the supplier you’re ordering from? If not – perhaps because the supplier bought the product from a local wholesaler – is it a company you know and are comfortable with? The name on the GCC is the party certifying compliance – the party legally responsible if something goes wrong – and ultimately the party you’re entrusting with your client’s logo. And if this isn’t challenging enough, if the supplier buys a blank from an importer and then decorates the product, you need two GCCs – one for the product and one for the decoration.

Recommendation 3 (Responsible party): Look at the GCC for the party certifying compliance. If it is not the supplier you’re buying the product from then learn who the importer is and whether it is someone you feel is reliable. Also, in that circumstance, find out if the decoration is to be applied by the importer or someone else – your supplier or a sub contractor. If the answer is “someone else” you’ll need a separate GCC for the decoration.

The next important point relates to testing. The GCC requires the date and place where the product was tested for each regulation cited on the GCC and it requires the identification of any third-party laboratory on whose testing the certification depends. Look at the test reports you received and be sure they correspond to exactly what you see on the GCC. The lab name, test date and tests listed should match one for one with the same information noted on the GCC.

Recommendation 4 (Testing): I have written previously on the topic of how to read test reports to be sure your product complies as well as on the limitations of these reports. Review these articles at http://rickbrenner.com and keep them handy for reference. In a nutshell, be sure you have a current test report from a CPSC-certified third party laboratory, that the report is for the identical product, SKU number and color that you ordered, that it includes legible photographs of the product, and that it certifies compliance with every regulation identified on the GCC. You should also be sure that the test report is based on the most current version of the law. A passing grade from June 2011 doesn’t necessarily mean that the product passes the new lead threshold that took effect in August 2011.

There are a few other things to note as well:

A separate GCC is required for every production run – indicating the manufacture date. Be sure that that the GCC you receive is specific to the product you’ve received.

Ask your supplier to confirm that the product you are receiving is being manufactured in the same factory where the tested product was manufactured, that there have been no changes in the design or bill of materials since the test and that the tested product was produced from the same raw materials as your production pieces. If not, you should insist that your production pieces be tested.

It is best to communicate directly with your supplier’s compliance department or the supplier’s person responsible for compliance. Product safety laws are complicated and evolving. The people most likely to know the most are those who deal with compliance every day. My recommendation is to deal with suppliers who are knowledgeable about these product safety and compliance matters and who provide you with direct phone and email access to get your questions answered.

This article applies specifically to the children’s product provisions in the Consumer Product Safety Improvement Act (CPSIA). There are other federal product safety regulations and there are several state regulations. PPAI has developed an excellent tool called Turbo Test to help distributors and suppliers determine the regulations that may apply to a wide range of products in the industry and PPAI also has a relationship with a third party laboratory that is available to advise members. Also, there are many attorneys whose practices include a specialty in product safety legislation.

Prime Sample GCC

CPSC Sample Format – GCC (Note: This link also includes an FAQ from the Commission about GCCs)

Sell Your Strengths, Respect Your Competitors

October 2, 2011 ~ Rick Brenner ~ Leave a comment

Raise your hand if you like negative campaign ads.

No hands? I’m not surprised. It’s hard to imagine that anyone does. They’re ugly, depressing and usually twist truths out of context.

Sure, I know they’re designed to put doubts in voters heads – like crafty litigators who say something inadmissible in court even if the judge tells the jury to ignore what they just heard.

But isn’t the objective in sales to get our customers to vote for us, not against our competitors?

Your prospects and customers can buy many of the same products or services you sell from a million other people. But they can only get you from you. That’s your differentiator. Your creativity. Your integrity. Your enthusiasm. Your reliablity. Your follow up. Your experience. In the precious few minutes of face time you get with your clients and prospects don’t you want them to fall in love with you, to learn how good you are, and all the ways that you can meet their needs? If you really are better than your competitor, if your product or service is truly a better value, that should come shining through without disparaging your competitor.

I’m not suggesting that you shouldn’t ever mention your competition. If you’re being asked to meet a competitor’s price on a bag that’s half the weight or size or quality of yours, then of course you should do a point by point comparison. Product and service comparisons are often part of any good buyer’s due diligence. But respect your competitor and do it ethically and accurately.

There are lots of good examples of companies who have been able to effectively tout their strengths and their competitors weaknesses in a single message. Think of Avis’ “We Try Harder” campaign against market leader Hertz. Or the campaign of another number two, the spectacularly successful Apple “I’m a Mac, I’m a PC” campaign showing how easily their cool guy got things done versus the nerdy and kludgy PC. Classy. Effective. Respectful.

Both of these campaigns are actually complimenting their competition. If Hertz and PCs weren’t beating the pants off of Avis and Apple in market share then neither one would have spent so many millions focusing on them.

Complimenting your competition is often a great way to win the respect and appreciation of your prospect. You’re saying, “You did a good job in selecting that company.” Certainly you’ll want to point out what you do differently or product categories where your company shines against the competitor. But you’ve respected your competitor in the process and your customer will appreciate it.

I recently had a conversation with the compliance manager of a major distributor who was surveying suppliers about their product safety programs. She told me some information about a major competitor that I knew wasn’t true. I could have just moved to the next subject but I didn’t. I told her that I didn’t think the information she had was correct and I gave her the email address of the CEO of that supplier to get it clarified. Then I emailed the CEO myself to give him an opportunity to get it fixed. Crazy? I don’t think so. First of all, it was the right thing to do. Second, sooner or later this situation is going to pay dividends. It’s a small world we live in, particularly in the promotional products industry, and to a borrow an old cliche, what goes around, comes around. People appreciate honesty and especially when they know it is potentially to your disadvantage. At that point you become a trusted advisor, which is the most coveted position you can have with a customer.

Sell your strengths. Respect your competitors. And remember this: The most successful among us got that way because they had the best value proposition for their customers. Focus on that and you’ll never have to worry about your competitors.