Trouble in Toyland 2024: Unsafe toys that slip through border
Loophole allows unsafe toys from overseas to flood market; inexpensive products often aren't inspected and don't meet U.S. safety standards
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Scrolling online, you see a brightly colored, wooden peg sorting toy. It has 25 blocks that a toddler can play with and fit onto the pegs. It looks fun and educational, and it’s only $4.04 with free shipping. It’ll be a great holiday gift, you tell yourself.
What you may not realize: The listing does not name the manufacturer. The toy is being shipped directly from overseas. And the Consumer Product Safety Commission has issued violation notices about similar wooden toddler toys also shipped from overseas because they don’t comply with U.S. safety requirements. Does this toy contain lead or other toxics? Could small parts break off and choke a child? Was it even tested?
When you buy a toy or any other product online and it’s shipped directly to you from another country, it generally doesn’t get inspected before it gets to your mailbox.
And when products are shipped in bulk but the value is below the threshold that requires examination, the products generally don’t get inspected by U.S. Customs and Border Protection because of a loophole for so-called “de minimis,” or low value packages.
In both cases, the items often don’t meet U.S. standards. Once the products arrive at your home or in the warehouse of an online seller, if regulators find out about any dangers – from consumers, retailers or their own investigators – they often are powerless to stop the online sales or take the sellers to court to pursue recalls.
It’s a growing problem made possible by aggressive marketing from international sellers, incomplete U.S. laws and the popularity of online shopping that surged during the pandemic.
You see companies putting a $700 value on 20 giant crates of goods worth hundreds of thousands of dollars. They're lying.Rich Trumka
Commissioner, CPSC
In the last decade, the number of international shipments that claim to be exempt from inspection has surged from 140 million a year to 1 billion a year. That’s nearly 3 million shipments every single day on average.
This includes more than children’s products; it includes all types of consumer products and machinery for businesses.
For a tiny glimpse at the prevalence of this problem, U.S PIRG Education Fund analyzed two tactics the Consumer Product Safety Commission (CPSC) does have: Issuing obscure Notices of Violation and issuing public warnings that consumers almost never find out about.
A look at CPSC notices of violation:
- The CPSC issued 1,020 notices of violation from January through July 2024. Of those, about 300 were for toys, not counting items such as art materials, scooters, or bike helmets.
- In 2023, the CPSC issued more than 2,300 violation notices. About 800 of those were for toys.
- Among the nearly 3,400 violation notices over the two years, the CPSC issued only one public warning initially, records show, and that wasn’t for a toy; it was for a bike helmet that didn’t meet strength and impact standards. Last month, the CPSC did issue a warning for an infant busy board toy after the Vietnam-based company didn’t respond to a violation notice. The public violation notice database doesn’t yet include October data.
To reiterate, not all of those products were shipped directly to consumers from another country; the list also includes products sold by online retailers, which don’t have to follow the same laws as brick-and-mortar stores, and lower-tier physical stores that may not vet sellers as well as larger chains.
Among the toys issued violation notices: Games, infant busy boards, educational toys, children’s jewelry, blocks, plastic ride-on toys, baby teethers and stuffed animals.
While regulators and members of both parties in Congress have discussed ways to crack down, this gap in product safety remains. It’s particularly important when we’re talking about products for our children.
For now, we have the best chance of keeping our children safe if we watch where we’re buying products from and realize that direct-to-consumer items – while inexpensive and easy to find – put our families at risk.
It’s great news that most traditional toys such as stuffed animals, games, dolls and building sets have become safer overall.
This is true because most manufacturers and U.S. sellers comply with tougher laws adopted in 2008 and other child protection standards more recently. Toy safety is largely kept in check through good oversight by regulators, efforts by many manufacturers, watchdog work by consumer advocates including PIRG and more awareness by parents and caregivers. As one data point, toy-related deaths and injuries treated in emergency rooms among children 14 and younger declined by 13% since 2017.
The proliferation of toys from overseas manufacturers and often sold under the radar online is a newer phenomenon.
To be clear, the problem here isn’t all toys from China. About 80% of toys sold in the United States and Europe in 2023 were manufactured in China. Only a small percentage were deemed unsafe and those are usually sold direct to consumer or they enter the country through de minimis shipments.
For Trouble in Toyland 2024, we focus on this mounting threat, as well as new concerns about water beads, smart toys that invade children’s privacy, high-powered magnets, button cell batteries and the ease consumers still have buying recalled toys, even though it’s illegal to sell them.
About 3 billion toys and games are sold in the United States every year. Some of those are unsafe. Some of those lead to children being injured.
Every year, we see 150,000 or more toy-related deaths and injuries treated in emergency rooms among children 14 and younger.
This of course doesn’t include injuries treated in doctors’ offices or that don’t require medical attention. Some of these incidents are caused by misuse, but dangerous toys lead to way too many injuries among children, especially those most vulnerable, age 4 and younger.
Trouble in Toyland 2024 looks at some of the biggest threats and offers tips for shoppers and recommendations for lawmakers and regulators.
TOYS THAT EVADE INSPECTION
Toys and other imported products slip through regulation in two key ways:
- Online sales, with packages mailed directly to consumers.
- Shipments that arrive at the ports but their shippers claim the crates or containers are of such low value that they don’t warrant paperwork or inspection and aren’t subject to duties or taxes. These shipments may be on their way to warehouses for traditional or online U.S.-based sellers. The low-value shipments are called de minimis.
All children’s products require certification from a third party. Unfortunately, some overseas companies lie about the contents of their shipments. They may say a shipment contains household goods, when it actually contains toys. Low-value household goods wouldn’t require the same paperwork.
Any children’s products that arrive at the U.S. border without paperwork that documents compliance with U.S. safety standards are problematic from the start, said Nancy Cowles, executive director of Kids In Danger, a Chicago product safety organization.
“There’s no safety testing on these products,” Cowles said. “It’s illegal.” But families usually have no idea about this, she said. Toys and other children’s products must comply with restrictions on issues such as lead, phthalates and small parts.
The exception for de minimis shipments increased from $200 to $800 in 2016, giving companies more room to fudge the value of shipments. The materials and labor are low cost, and the companies don’t have to pay taxes, so the items typically are much less expensive than you’d see in the United States. A toy that sells for $30 or $40 in the United States might sell for $5 from an overseas company.
“You see companies putting a $700 value on 20 giant crates of goods worth hundreds of thousands of dollars,” said Rich Trumka, one of five commissioners with the Consumer Product Safety Commission.
U.S. Customs and Border Protection wants to catch these companies so that proper taxes are collected and the products can be inspected for safety.
“They’re lying about what’s in the packages, they’re lying about the value of it and it’s an incredibly difficult task to figure out what’s in the packages by looking at them, until you crack them open,” Trumka said in an interview with U.S. PIRG Education Fund. “And the volume of it is extraordinary.”
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“It makes the job incredibly difficult and American consumers are at extreme risk because of it,” Trumka said.
The pandemic effect
Our ability to buy a toy or most any other item online and get it delivered to our mailbox or doorstep has existed for two decades. Online marketplaces have expanded incredibly in recent years. These days, big, traditional retailers offer many items only online, not in their stores.
Consumers’ comfort with online purchases widened when the pandemic hit in 2020. Worldwide, e-commerce sales grew from 14% to 18% of retail sales from 2019 to 2020, according to the International Trade Administration.
In the United States, CPSC Chair Alex Hoehn-Saric notes that total e-commerce sales were estimated at a little more than $1 trillion in 2022, an increase of 8% from the year before. And the sales keep rising.
Meanwhile, newer online marketplaces are expanding into the U.S. market. All of that adds up to a newer, largely unregulated way for companies to sell their products. Many of the products may be perfectly safe and meet all U.S. standards. But many of them do not. It can be difficult to detect without inspection and testing.
Temu and Shein worry some
The risk increases when the company is based overseas and doesn’t work with a U.S. importer, distributor, manufacturer or retailer that is regulated by the Consumer Product Safety Commission.
In some cases, a shopper may not even realize a product was sent from overseas because the company sent items in bulk to be shipped out from a U.S. address.
Two of the companies raising the biggest flags for U.S. regulators are Temu, based in China, and Shein, founded in China and now is headquartered in Singapore. Since January 2023, the CPSC issued notices of violation on numerous products sold by Temu and Shein, including puzzles, push-pull toys, toy guns, musical toys and wooden sorting toys.
“In just the last two years roughly, Chinese online marketplaces have exploded in size, selling cheap goods at dumping prices into the American market,” U.S. Rep. Dan Bishop (R-N.C.) said in a brief speech in Congress in April. “What is causing this? Well, they learned to exploit fully the de minimis tariff loophole.”
Bishop said that in 2023, nearly a billion packages entered the United States because the shippers claimed they’re de minimis. That’s about 3 million shipments per day. Temu and Shein comprise about one-third of all de minimis shipments, he said. “That is not de minimis business. It is big money.”
Just three weeks ago, the 27-nation European Union announced it’s investigating whether Temu allows the sale of illegal and unsafe products. Temu has 92 million users in the European Union, which includes countries such as France, Spain, Italy and Germany.
In the United States, commissioners at the CPSC are also sounding the alarms.
Temu commands 17% of U.S. sales for online discount retailers
In a speech in February, Hoehn-Saric, the CPSC chair, cited Temu. The Temu shopping app launched in September 2022. By November 2023, it held nearly 17% of online discount store sales among U.S. shoppers. It wants more. Temu spent tens of millions of dollars on TV advertisements during the last Super Bowl, which was watched by 123 million viewers, he said.
“As more platforms enter the market and as more consumers turn to e-commerce, it is critical that online marketplaces act as responsible gatekeepers to protect their users from hazardous products,” Hoehn-Saric said. He wants companies to do more voluntarily to hold third-party sellers accountable.
CPSC Commissioners Peter Feldman and Douglas Dziak want CPSC staff to explore whether online platforms such as Temu, Shein and other foreign-owned companies obey the Consumer Product Safety Act.
“This examination will inform the Commission on the legal status of these platforms,” Feldman and Dziak wrote in a statement in September. “To the extent a platform falls outside the Commission’s reach, policymakers must understand where gaps exist and how best to address them. Likewise, the Commission must better understand what enforcement challenges exist with respect to foreign third-party sellers.”
Feldman and Dziak are also concerned about reports that thousands of Chinese manufacturers and vendors have signed on to provide products to Shein and Temu, which they noted have soared in popularity thanks to their super low-cost consumer products.
Trumka, another CPSC commissioner, said, “Before these emerging e-commerce platforms could undercut the cost of everything else, they didn’t exist. They came into existence because of this loophole and flooded the market with potentially dangerous goods.”
Shoppers often assume online sellers are just as reputable as the Target or Best Buy or Kohls you can drive to, Hoehn-Saric said. They’re not. And consumers often have no recourse if the product is defective, unsafe or just junk.
“Too often consumers are left holding a defective product while the online marketplace they purchased it from points the finger of blame at the same seller the marketplace allowed on its site,” Hoehn-Saric said.
“Too often unscrupulous manufacturers selling online disappear after being contacted by CPSC about a hazardous product. And even when CPSC is able to get an online marketplace to take a listing down, that same product listing can reappear on the same marketplace under a different manufacturer’s name within days.”
“This game of online whack-a-mole must stop,” Hoehn-Saric said.
As one tactic, Feldman said the CPSC’s eSAFE team actively searches e-commerce sites for banned or recalled product listings. In a new strategy, the CPSC in June launched an online complaint portal for businesses to report violations. Feldman and Dziak pushed for the concept, which is aimed at giving companies, importers and other businesses a way to report unsafe or noncompliant products more easily.
Amazon’s new venture to ship directly from China
Regulators and lawmakers already concerned about overseas direct-to-consumer purchases have a new player to watch: Online giant Amazon on Nov. 13 announced a new venture, “Amazon Haul,” which the company says will offer “crazy low prices.” Purchases will ship directly to consumers from a warehouse in China.
All products will cost $20 or less, with most at $10 or less and some for just $1.
Haul will compete with Temu, Shein and TikTok Shop.
Purchases will take longer to arrive, typically one to two weeks, as opposed to Amazon’s typical same-day or one- or two-day delivery.
“Amazon screens the products sellers offer in Haul,” the company said in its announcement, adding that all products will be screened “so customers can be confident they’ll receive products that are safe, authentic, and compliant with applicable regulations.”
The company said all purchases will be protected by Amazon’s A-to-z guarantee, which “covers product condition, including if the item is damaged, defective, or not as described.” However, items priced at less than $3 won’t be eligible for return.
The concern here is that Amazon hasn’t always cooperated with recall requests from the CPSC. That’s what led to a 2021 case against Amazon by the CPSC. After hearings and appeals in court, the CPSC in July 2024 unanimously determined that Amazon is a “distributor” for certain products that are defective or violate safety standards. That makes Amazon responsible for recalls. Amazon requested a stay from the CPSC; the CPSC opposed the motion, saying any stay request should go through federal district court.
Products listed on Amazon Haul include a “cartoon penguin coin purse money bag plush doll” for $1.78, a 180-piece set of “children’s car truck stickers” for $2.99, a “DIY black pink children’s toys cartoon decoration crafts ornament mini rabbit figurines rabbit doll” for $2.54 and a “school large capacity children straw cup water cup cartoon water bottle” for $6.12.
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The push to close a big loophole
On products shipped in bulk overseas from a company, Feldman and Dziak said U.S. regulators have work to do. “We seek to better understand these firms, particularly their focus on low-value direct-to-consumer – sometimes called de minimis – shipments and the enforcement challenges when
Chinese firms with little or no U.S. presence distribute consumer products through these platforms.
“This form of commerce can benefit consumers and sellers in many ways, but CPSC must make clear its expectations regarding these platforms’ responsibilities to ensure safety,” the commissioners said.
In September, the White House said it wants to tighten import rules to stop countries from claiming a de minimis exception on a huge volume of their shipments to the United States.
Current exclusions allow not only unsafe products, but also allow counterfeit products and illegal drugs such as fentanyl to pour in. In addition, de minimis shipments into the United States are not subject to duties and taxes.
All of this hurts not only U.S. consumers, but also manufacturers, workers and retailers.
“The dramatic increase in direct-to-consumer sales, especially from sellers and websites based outside of the U.S., increases concerns about products that do not meet our strict safety standards,” said Joan Lawrence, senior vice president of standards and regulatory affairs at The Toy Association, the industry’s trade group.
“It puts consumers at risk, and hurts responsible toy companies which go to great lengths to make safe, quality brands and products,” Lawrence said.
The White House called on Congress to pass laws to reform de minimis exceptions.
Such legislation, the Consumer Product Safety Inspection Enhancement Act, was introduced in 2020 by Rep. Jan Schakowsky, (D-Illinois,) and co-sponsored by Rep. Jeff Duncan (R-S.C.). A separate bill, the Ensure Accountability in De Minimis Act, was introduced in April 2024 by Sen. Mike Braun (R-Indiana) and co-sponsored by Sen. Tammy Baldwin (D-Wisconsin.) Neither bill got out of committee.
Hiding hundreds of thousands of dollars worth of goods
Sometimes, U.S. Customs and Border Protection and the CPSC do catch unsafe toys at the border. The CPSC, in collaboration with Customs, confiscated nearly 1.6 million dangerous or illegal toys in fiscal year 2024, up from 1.1 million in fiscal year 2023, according to the CPSC. Nearly 102,000 of the toys seized this year contained unsafe levels of lead, which can cause brain damage, nervous system problems and other health issues.
Only a small fraction of hazardous products get seized, Trumka said. Most of them get through. That’s not the fault of Customs or the CPSC, he stressed. It’s the existing law, humongous volume and lack of resources.
In some cases, the unsafe products coming across the border aren’t sold by foreign-based websites or obscure retailers. They’re sold by companies as well known as Amazon and Walmart.com. For years, the CPSC has tangled with Amazon because, when the CPSC discovers unsafe products sold exclusively by Amazon, the online giant sometimes won’t cooperate with a recall.
The CPSC issues warnings for the most worrisome products; it has issued 58 so far this year (through Nov. 8) for toys and other products. Of those, 22 were sold exclusively by Amazon; three were sold exclusively by Amazon and Walmart.com. Nearly all of the products sold exclusively by Amazon and Walmart.com originated overseas.
The CPSC during the next year will officially focus more on e-commerce platforms. The amendment to the CPSC’s
formal operating plan was adopted unanimously by commissioners. That reflects “the seriousness of these issues and recognition that more needs to be done to police e-commerce and keep American families safe from dangerous products manufactured overseas,” said Feldman, who pushed for the amendment.
Cowles noted that a crackdown at the border and elimination of the $800 threshold for exemption wouldn’t necessarily affect all direct-to-consumer packages.
That’s where consumer awareness may come in.
WATER BEADS
Consumer advocates have sounded the alarm about water beads for more than two years. Water beads are a colorful, squishy sensory toy. Some are small as pinheads or ice cream sprinkles. The problem is, as the name suggests, they expand when exposed to water, from the size of a pea, for example, to two inches in diameter.
If a child swallows one of these beads that look like candy, it can expand. If it’s swallowed or inserted into an ear canal, the water beads absorb bodily fluids and expand. This can and has led to a blocked airway, intestinal or bowel blockage, lung or ear damage and other life-altering injuries.
About 6,000 people were treated in emergency rooms in calendar year for injuries or illnesses caused by water beads, according to the CPSC. At least one death is blamed on water beads: a 10-month-old in Wisconsin died in July 2023.
The CPSC in September 2023 issued a strong warning to families to keep water beads out of any place where babies and young children might be. It’s not enough to make sure they’re picked up after play; it’s nearly impossible to be absolutely sure that something the size of an ice cream sprinkle didn’t roll away. They just shouldn’t be in the same homes or buildings as children.
In December 2023, Amazon, Walmart and Target announced they would prohibit sales of water beads marketed to young children.
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The news followed an investigation by Consumer Reports, which began pressuring retailers to stop selling water beads.
Bills have been introduced in Congress that would restrict water beads marketed as toys. The Ban Water Beads Act was introduced in Congress in November 2023 by Frank Pallone Jr., (D-N.J.), and Esther’s Law was introduced in May 2024 by Sen. Tammy Baldwin (D-Wisconsin.) It’s named after the Wisconsin baby who died after ingesting a water bead. Both bills sat in committees.
Meanwhile, the injuries continue to mount.
In July 2024, at least five children were injured and taken to the hospital in Bossier City, La. One child was in intensive care.
The CPSC this year proposed rules to regulate water beads marketed as toys, and other toys with “expanding materials.” That’s defined as any toy that expands by at least 50%. Comments are due Dec. 8, 2024.
Others want to see a ban on any water beads with bright colors – no matter what their labeled use is – because they could look like candy to young children. Despite the public warnings, proposed federal laws and retailer announcements to stop selling water beads as toys, the practice continues.
As two examples, U.S. PIRG Education Fund purchased two different types of water beads, in November 2023 and May 2024. The products were described as sensory toys when we bought them. The same products are now described as vase fillers or home decorations.
In 2023, nearly a billion packages entered the U.S. through the $800 de minimis loophole ... That is not de minimis business. It is big money.U.S. Rep Dan Bishop (R-N.C.)
RECOMMENDATIONS
- Lawmakers should quickly address ways to prevent dangerous, untested toys (and other dangerous items) from entering the United States. This may involve legislation regulating de minimis shipments and could require more resources for Customs and Border Protection and the Consumer Product Safety Commission.
- Traditional retailers and online marketplaces should do more to prevent recalled toys and counterfeit/knockoff toys from being sold.
- The CPSC should step up enforcement and impose meaningful penalties against merchants that sell counterfeit or recalled toys. This may require more resources.
- The CPSC should get clarity on whether federal law allows online retailers such as Facebook Marketplace and eBay to sell recalled toys without the same multi-million-dollar consequences that regulators impose on brick-and-mortar retailers.
- Toy manufacturers should commit to do a better job of improving testing and adhering to existing toy safety standards.
- Lawmakers should pass stronger data privacy laws, explicitly prohibiting companies from gathering more data from consumers than is necessary to deliver the service a consumer is expecting to get, and use it for any secondary purposes, especially for data that could be generated while using a VR headset.
- We support the bipartisan COPPA 2.0, introduced in 2023, to update the 1998 Children’s Online Privacy Protection Act to better protect kids’ and teens’ privacy online regarding data collection, advertising and a parent’s ability to delete their child’s stored data.
- We support the bipartisan TOTS Act, which would require companies that sell high-tech smart toys to clearly label on the box if it contains a Wi-Fi connection and the ability to gather data on children. It was introduced in January 2023.
- We support the Sunshine in Product Safety Act, which would allow the CPSC to warn consumers more quickly about all kinds of dangerous products, including toys, in advance of a recall. It was reintroduced in March 2023.
- We support enforcement of the federal INFORM Act, which took effect in June 2023. It’s aimed at cracking down on U.S. sellers that allow counterfeiters and thieves.
Topics
Authors
Teresa Murray
Consumer Watchdog, U.S. PIRG Education Fund
Teresa directs the Consumer Watchdog office, which looks out for consumers’ health, safety and financial security. Previously, she worked as a journalist covering consumer issues and personal finance for two decades for Ohio’s largest daily newspaper. She received dozens of state and national journalism awards, including Best Columnist in Ohio, a National Headliner Award for coverage of the 2008-09 financial crisis, and a journalism public service award for exposing improper billing practices by Verizon that affected 15 million customers nationwide. Teresa and her husband live in Greater Cleveland and have two sons. She enjoys biking, house projects and music, and serves on her church missions team and stewardship board.
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