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This
should be the time of year when Santa’s wholesale elves in
the toy district in downtown
Los Angeles are busy delivering cheap, Chinese-made playthings to
consumers and retailers.
But toy
district merchants say sales this year are terrible—down
about 40 percent in many cases from a year earlier—and
they know all too well why that is.
“A lot of
people are afraid of toys that come from China,” said
Justino Bello, 28, a salesman at one of the district’s
numerous hole-in-the-wall outlets. “Toys just aren’t big
this year.”
So are the
safety concerns justified?
Bello smiled sheepishly. “No comment on that,” he said.
Since the
1970s, the 12-block toy district has been the city’s
central bazaar for imported toy cars, action figures and
other knickknacks. Its wholesale outlets funnel goods to
stores near and far.
Yet in a
year that has seen millions of toys recalled for lead
paint and other potentially dangerous defects, the toy
district highlights the difficulty, if not impossibility,
of preventing unsafe goods from reaching US children under
the current system of relying on overseas manufacturers to
meet US safety standards.
If nothing
else, the toy district speaks to a need for US authorities
to be more aggressive in inspecting the goods arriving on
US shores—through increased random checks, if no other
way—and for US manufacturers and importers to be held
accountable for any safety violations.
This would
only benefit merchants and consumers.
“People
see in the news that the toys are not safe,” said Jimmy
Hernandez, 40, who runs a small shop in the area. “People
are scared.”
Indeed, he
told me he wouldn’t give the toys he sells to his own
kids. “Not now,” Hernandez said.
According
to the Consumer Product Safety Commission, roughly 25
million toys have been recalled in the
United States
this year. Nearly all involved lead paint or choking
hazards. Most of the toys were manufactured in China.
High-profile toy companies such as Mattel Inc. apologized
to customers and pledged to crack down on shoddy
manufacturing abroad.
But for
every Mattel that steps up and takes responsibility for
unsafe imported goods entering the
US
market, thousands of smaller businesses continue operating
unchanged, maintaining a steady pipeline of largely
uninspected products.
“The
global marketplace presents a challenge to product safety
and regulation,” said Julie Vallese, a spokesman for the
commission.
I spent a
day roaming the warrens and back alleys of LA’s toy
district, chatting with shop owners, employees and
customers. Many area denizens speak only Chinese or Korean
(or profess no skill in English when a reporter starts
asking questions). Some people I spoke with refused to
give their names.
But what I
ultimately picked up from my wanderings was that most toy
district wholesalers have no clue as to where and how a
particular item was manufactured, or what procedures were
in place, if any, to ensure compliance with US safety
standards.
Many shops
rely on middlemen to do the importing and know nothing
about the toys they sell beyond what’s on the shipping
invoice. Others do their own importing, obtaining goods
directly from Chinese factories.
It was at
one such shop that I found the “Luxury Doctor” toy medical
set, which contains a plastic stethoscope, a pair of
plastic scalpels and a small vial marked “Drug” that was
just about the right size to lodge in a child’s throat.
Tammy
Shin, 35, the shop’s owner, acknowledged that safety
concerns were hampering her sales. But this has been
mitigated by the fact that the Luxury Doctor set and most
of her other toys mainly go to Mexico.
Shin said
Mexican retailers routinely travel across the border to
the toy district to find cheap playthings they can load
onto trucks and sell in Mexico City and elsewhere.
“Many
times, they don’t know the importers,” Shin said. “That’s
why they come here.”
I asked
about product safety.
“For
locals, safety is an issue,” Shin said. “But for the
people from Mexico, no.”
The Luxury
Doctor set has a notice at the bottom that reads:
“Warning, Choking Hazard—small parts, not suitable for
children under six years.”
As the
father of a six-year-old, I can say with complete
confidence that no self-respecting child that age would
have the inclination to play with a cheap plastic
stethoscope and some plastic scalpels, except to judge
their merit as projectiles.
Something
like this would be of greatest interest to a three- or
four-year-old. In any case, the warning on the package is
in English, not Spanish.
Vance
Baugham, president of the World Trade Center Association,
Los Angeles-Long Beach, a subsidiary of the Los Angeles
County Economic Development Corp., said it was difficult
to prevent unsafe goods from getting to store shelves.
“Due to
the high volume, a lot slips through the cracks,” he said.
Baugham
said the dwindling value of the dollar was hurting
manufacturers in China. As a result, he said, some might
be cutting corners on safety to boost profits.
He said it
primarily was up to US importers to uphold safety
standards for goods brought into the country and for
parents to be careful about the toys they give their
children.
“Imagine
how slow it would be for consumer products to get into the
United States if we had to inspect everything for lead or
other safety considerations,” Baugham said. “We wouldn’t
have Christmas presents until the summer.”
At one toy
district shop, I found a small plastic car with easily
removed, choking-hazard-size wheels. I asked the shop’s
owner, Woosung Lim, 50, if the car had been tested for
safety.
“I don’t
know,” he said. “I get it from an importer. That’s all I
know.”
Christmas
in July is looking better every day. |
