On December 31, 2011, the stay of enforcement enacted by the Consumer Product Safety Commission (CPSC) formally expires. After December 31st all children's products must be certified by a CPSC accepted third party conformity assessment body for lead content, the mandatory toy safety standard and phthalates, where applicable. The importer or manufacturer must issue a children's product certificate supported by the third party test results and that certificate must accompany the product into commerce and be furnished to the distributor or retailer after December 31, 2011.

Testing Issues
The CPSC has issued a final rule allowing for the use of component testing supporting certification of a children's product. Component testing, as outlined by the Commission, is voluntary and can be undertaken by either the manufacturer of the component or the manufacturer of the children's product. For those in the SGIA community producing children's wearing apparel, the textile garment does not need to be tested as it has been exempted through regulation. Only the other components, such as ink, zippers, buttons, etc., must be tested for lead content. If the children's product could also be classified as a child care article, only those plasctized elements need to be tested, and a component testing program can also be initiated to satisfy the testing requirements.

Again, a reminder, component testing has been adopted as a voluntary option for the testing and certification of children's products. If you produce children's products, you are encouraged to contact your suppliers to determine if they will be conducting testing in accordance with the CPSC testing protocols.

Also, all testing must be done by a laboratory that has been recognized by the CPSC. And, the correct testing methodology must be used. The following link does provide information to businesses that must test their products: http://www.cpsc.gov/cgi-bin/labsearch/. Once on this site, you can search by location or test protocol. For manufacturers of children's products, the appropriate test method is CPSC-CH-E1002-08 and/or CPSC-CH-E1002-08.1, Lead in Non-Metal Children's Products.

Testing of inks used by our industry may fall under the aforementioned test method, or they could fall under the testing requirements found in 16 CFR Part 1303, Lead Paint. The lead limit for the Lead in Paint requirement is set at 90 parts per million, while the lead content for the CPSIA is set at 100 ppm. Based on recent conversations with the CPSC staff, the lead in paint test method must be used for all ink systems that DO NOT become a part of the substrate. The actual definition of a "paint" or "coating" is as follows: as "a fluid, semi-fluid or other material, with or without a suspension of finely divided coloring matter, which changes to a solid film when a thin layer is applied to a metal, wood, stone, paper, leather, cloth, plastic, or other surface. The term does not include printing inks or those materials which actually become a part of the substrate, such as the pigment in a plastic article, or those materials which are actually bonded to the substrate, such as by electroplating or ceramic glazing." (Emphasis added) SGIA continues to work with the CPSC staff to ensure that the proper test method is applied to both our component parts as well as our final products.

General Conformity Certificates
All manufacturers of consumer products that are required to meet a specific CPSC safety or testing standard must issue a General Conformity Certificate (GCC) to accompany their products that have been manufactured on or after December 31, 2011. Note that this requirement of a General Conformity Certificate applies to ALL consumer products with an associated test or safety requirement.

For those facilities manufacturing "Clothing textiles are some", referred to in CPSC literature as general wearing apparel, must comply with the requirements of the Flammable Fabric Act for clothing textiles. If you receive a GCC with your blank garments, then you must also issue a GCC to your final customer. You are not required to perform any further tests, unless the garment becomes either a children's product or a child care article. However, you are required to pass the information downstream regarding the flammability requirements.

Members
Nonmembers

Review our CPSIA overview.
SGIA members: Take advantage of these resources:

Fact Sheets:

• Component-Part Testing
• General Conformity Certificate
• Small Batch Manufacturers
• Tracking Labels

• CPSIA Testing Programs — Who Has to Test What, and How! (December 7, 2011)
• CPSIA Certification — What You Need To Do (December 8, 2011)