CSPIA: What You Should Know

What is the CSPIA?

After a spate of imported children’s products were found to contain lead, the United States Congress quickly drafted and passed the CPSIA, or the Consumer Product Safety Improvement Act (CPSIA) in August 2008. This law is slated to go into implementation on February 10, 2009.

Among other things, the CPSIA bans lead and phthalates in children's products, mandates third party testing and certification, and requires manufacturers of all goods for children under the age of 12 to permanently label each item with a date and batch number.

Under the very important auspices of child safety, the CPSIA may have grave unintended consequences: fewer choices for families who are looking for handcrafted alternatives. Many Etsy artists and craftspeople have expressed fears that they won't be able stay in business due to the burdensome cost of testing and certification pursuant to the proposed legislation.

So what does this mean?

Walter Olson of Forbes and overlawyered.com puts it succinctly:

“As of Feb. 10, it will become unlawful to make or sell anything intended for use by children under 12 without a program to test the goods for lead — even if no items of their kind have ever been found to pose a lead risk, even if you make and sell only a few inexpensive items a year, even if you've sourced their materials from the most conscientious local suppliers and even if they're items toddlers seldom convey into their mouths, such as dartboards or bicycle tires.

In August, relatively lenient self-checks will give way to a much costlier mandate for ‘third-party’ lab testing. That will mean testing every lot of goods — typically each style/size combination — at a cost of perhaps hundreds of dollars per lot for simple items, and potentially much more than that for items with multiple colors, components or materials.

Because there is at present no green light for once-for-all component testing, the same bit of elastic or fabric trim will have to be tested again and again as part of each lot.”

Read more here.

What to do?

Contact the government. Details are listed in the link above. The sample letter sums it up best:

The economic crisis in our country is already devastating millions in this country. That is why it concerns me that under the CPSIA, even more small business owners will be driven out of business, deepening the crisis. The premise of self-reliance and entrepreneurship on which this country was founded is in jeopardy.

Under the very important auspices of child safety, the CPSIA may have grave unintended consequences: fewer choices for families who are looking for handcrafted and secondhand alternatives. Many artists, vintage sellers, and craftspeople have expressed fears that they won't be able stay in business due to the burdensome cost of testing and certification pursuant to the proposed legislation.

I urge you, please, hold a hearing before February 10th, to delay implementation of the CPSIA. It is essential that you amend this well-intentioned law in order to protect this thriving and crucial part of the American economy. Failure to do so will unnecessarily devastate countless people, many of your constituents among them.

It is time to do what you meant to do with the CPSIA, and truly protect your fellow Americans and their children.