The CPSC -- What are they thinking?

It is the holiday season. Shopping is at, or at least supposed to be at, an all time high. Great time for the printing industry. Then, the Consumer Product Safety Commision begins to implement the provisions of the Consumer Product Safety Information Act of 2008 or the CPSIA. In THEORY, this is a feel good piece of legislation. No one wants children exposed to high levels of lead. No one wants children exposed to high levels of any dangerous chemicals. You cannot argue with the premise of the new legislation. It is the IMPLEMENTATION of the new law that is causing headaches across the board.

There are new provisions for testing and certification of children's products for lead. Sounds great. Again, no one wants to expose children to lead. First, Amazon, one of the largest online sellers of books, asked that all books be certified. Or, the books would be removed from sale. This is just the tip of the iceberg. What if the product never contained lead? Do we still need to certify? Do we need to certify every product that is produced or can we certify by "batch"?

No one argues that the CPSC does not have the authority to issue these policies and regulations, but the timing really does stink. In the midst of this holiday shopping season, retailers are asking printing companies to scramble to meet requirements that have yet to be finalized. Where is the logic in that?

SGIA continues to work with the CPSC, comment on the many policies that are being issued, participate in meetings... I would be interested if anyone has a story to share .... Thanks.

Submitted by Marci Kinter, SGIA