Sears and non-compliant seats

Emi's Mommy

New member
My sears had the new one out since at least Christmas. It's even on sale this week for 149!

I haven't been back after new years to see if the seats they had clearance have been pulled.... Or even sold.
 
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snowbird25ca

Moderator - CPST Instructor
Hmm I was at sears in NB and they looked like they werecarrying the new Graco MR it was a LX65 for $200 baby head insert was different and material was different. I didn't see many seats but all the ones at this one looked new. Maybe its an alberta thing and the crappy staff turnover they have

I'm kind of doubtful since it's management responsible for it in the end, but I know the Sears at west end has had at least one of the baby workers in that department for over 4 years - she was the one who processed the purchase when I bought ds the EFTA and that was just over 4yrs ago.

It still doesn't explain the website though.
 
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VanIsleMommy

Guest
health canada wants me to fill out an incident report now, which is a pain in the arse. I'll send it but why they can't simply act on the information they have is beyond me.
 

snowbird25ca

Moderator - CPST Instructor
health canada wants me to fill out an incident report now, which is a pain in the arse. I'll send it but why they can't simply act on the information they have is beyond me.

Thanks for following up on this. Too bad they can't act without a complaint being filed - guess they need to have people actively doing enforcement checks before they can look in to it themselves? (I read that they do compliance checks on a scheduled basis for some other things affected by the same regulations, so perhaps stores being checked falls in to the same thing? I'm kind of surprised though - I would've expected them to go and check on major retailers to ensure compliance with the law...)
 

Keeanh

Well-known member
I sent an e-mail saying that I was concerned to see non-compliant seats still on their website and in stores. This is the reply I received. Obviously an outdated canned e-mail:

---------
Thank you for taking the time to contact Sears.

Please be advised that we have checked on this and have located the following information:

New Regulations on Car Seats Sold in Canada Starting on January 1st, 2012

On January 1st 2012, new regulations will come into effect for car seats / car seat components sold in Canada.

Transport Canada has moved to more closely harmonize Canadian Car Seat testing regulations with those in the US, to allow for a broader range of car seats being made available to Canadian customers. As a result Transport Canada has instituted minor changes to testing requirements.

Due to these changes a number of car seats have been discontinued and new models have been brought in to replace them. The current car seats are in no way unsafe and we can continue to sell them with confidence until later this year. Current child car seat requirements have provided a high level of safety for children for many years and these seats will continue to provide excellent protection throughout the life of the child seats.

Parents should be aware that there is no need to replace a child seat unless it was installed in a vehicle involved in a collision. If the shell or materials on the seat are torn or damaged, the seat should also be replaced.

If you require any further assistance, please do not hesitate to contact us.

Thank you for choosing Sears.

Regards,

Angelique
 
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VanIsleMommy

Guest
uhm what??? obviously they were GROSSLY misinformed. but then again if someone from transport canada told me that it was illegal to IMPORT the car seats after Jan 1 no wonder there is confusion.

I emailed sears as well informing them that as of Jan 1 it became illegal to sell, advertise, or otherwise distribute car seats which are not compliant with the new 2012 standards, and that I have been in contact with health canada in regards to the issue who asked me to file an incident report. maybe that will get their attention.

personally though, I have to wonder if it's a case of claiming ignorance because they have too much stock and they're already in financial trouble with a risk of closing stores this year. I imagine trashing thousands of car seats would look bad on their bottom line.
 

snowbird25ca

Moderator - CPST Instructor
Feel free to save the google doc I linked to and then forward them the pdf. Apparently the message has been lost somewhere along the line and they need to see the notice.
 

misty073

New member
Can I ask a question? And please don't jump down my throat lol I really am curious:)

If HC isn't going and making sure these seats are off the shelves, and two weeks ago people were talking about the waste of them going to the dump, why is it such a concern that stores still have them on the shelf? It's not like they are recalled or unsafe.
 

KristineML

New member
My Sears in Hamilton (Home of the Original Graco-Radian) has on the shelf an Evenflo Chase with a 20lb minimum, a Nautilus with a 20lb minimum and an Evenflo Aura travel system with the Z-handle seat.

On the good side, they also have a Graco Urbanlite travel system with the Snugride 30 in Vance.
 
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VanIsleMommy

Guest
Can I ask a question? And please don't jump down my throat lol I really am curious:)

If HC isn't going and making sure these seats are off the shelves, and two weeks ago people were talking about the waste of them going to the dump, why is it such a concern that stores still have them on the shelf? It's not like they are recalled or unsafe.

it is a waste, and very unfortunate... but for a retail chain to ignore the laws and sell products that are not up to new standards for health and safety I find it very concerning. in fact it makes me not want to buy anything there.

for the consumer point of view, if I buy one of these seats at full price today, I won't be able to sell it or give it away when I'm done with it.
 

tam_shops

New member
Personally, I think the law should have gone after the manufactures in the first place, preventing them from *making* & *importing* the seats, not the stores/people from selling them.

If it's safe enough for my child to use in our car, it should be safe enough (if not expired/recalled) to sell on CL or give to a friend.

And, that would have solved the landfill problem too.

However, I didn't make the law and Sears (and everyone else) had TWO years to clear out the stock, so suck it up Buttercup at this point, the law is what it is and *especially* the stores need to follow them. If some random Manager at London Drugs knew *something* about new car seat rules and not being able to sell a 2010 Graco HBB in Jan 2012, then the person in charge of the baby department at Sears can and should be able to do *better* than this. Our Sears had few if any non-compliant seats Dec 2011, so *some* message was sent to them, at some point!

Further, if London Drugs gets to send the Graco HBB it had back to Graco and get their $$ back, I suspect that Sears will have a similar deal, at least w/ Graco...

tam
 

misty073

New member
Personally, I think the law should have gone after the manufactures in the first place, preventing them from *making* & *importing* the seats, not the stores/people from selling them.

tam

I'm sorry I don't understand this? Why would they go after the manufacturers for making them?
 

misty073

New member
I think because of the expiry dates on seats stores should have to mark seats down after they have been in the system for certain amounts of time...preventing someone from paying full price for a seat that is say1.5 years into its expiry. The longer it sits the cheaper it goes..
 

tam_shops

New member
Sorry Misty, I meant the law should have stopped them from *making* the seats at least 6mths ago and left it at that. Once they stop making them, they're out of the market. Then, the new ones are made and sold. Old ones diffuse out of the market as they expire. Personally, I'd have preferred that scenario to WM tossing the left overs...

100% agree that seats should be discounted for every 6mth they are *old*, it is unacceptable that someone that does not know better can pay full price for a seat that is 2-3 years old and then perhaps *use* that expired seat, not knowing b/c they *just* bought it...

tam
 

snowbird25ca

Moderator - CPST Instructor
Can I ask a question? And please don't jump down my throat lol I really am curious:)

If HC isn't going and making sure these seats are off the shelves, and two weeks ago people were talking about the waste of them going to the dump, why is it such a concern that stores still have them on the shelf? It's not like they are recalled or unsafe.

It's kind of like the difference between ff'ing a 25lb 15 month old vs. rf'ing a 25lb 15 month old. Both are legal, both are "safe" - but nobody will argue that rf'ing is safeR by a long shot. (Problem with this analogy is that it's not legal to sell old seats, but ignore that factor and hopefully the point comes across.)

Old seats are safe. They've kept kids safe up to this point and it's fine for parents to keep using them if they have them already, but the new seats are an improvement. They are most likely safeR. And in my honest opinion, a parent who is buying a new seat for their child deserves to be buying the safeR seat.

I am glad that retailers can't keep selling old seats legally. I am glad that they can't be sold 2nd hand because I do think that parents buying seats should benefit from the new standards.

The updated standards are a good thing. And if you were going to pay full price for a seat would you want one that met standards that had last been totally revised over a decade ago, or would you want one that met standards which had been completely updated in 2010? The changes were significant, important, and a long time coming. Nobody could expect or ask parents to replace a seat they've already used for 3 or 4 years. But somebody buying a new seat should be able to trust they are buying a seat that meets current standards - and that's the bottom line in my opinion.
 

snowbird25ca

Moderator - CPST Instructor
Sorry Misty, I meant the law should have stopped them from *making* the seats at least 6mths ago and left it at that. Once they stop making them, they're out of the market. Then, the new ones are made and sold. Old ones diffuse out of the market as they expire. Personally, I'd have preferred that scenario to WM tossing the left overs...

100% agree that seats should be discounted for every 6mth they are *old*, it is unacceptable that someone that does not know better can pay full price for a seat that is 2-3 years old and then perhaps *use* that expired seat, not knowing b/c they *just* bought it...

tam

I would be surprised if many manufacturers had made product for the Canadian market in the last 6 months that didn't comply. We didn't get any shipments of non-compliant carseats from September onward at our store - and that means they weren't at the warehouse either. I've seen Sept, Oct, and Nov dates on most of our new compliant stock with the exception of Britax, some were sooner. In most cases they were in our store less than 3 weeks after being manufactured.

I'm pretty sure that there was a "break" in many companies between production of old seats and production of new seats. In the end companies didn't want to have a bunch of stock being wasted either - remember that everyone has known since June that non-compliant seats couldn't be sold come January 1st...

However, I once tried to get a manager to mark down a carseat base that was 1.5yrs old and she wasn't willing to. The store had paid the same cost for it and stores don't look at seats as a cost per year of use. The idea that a customer might was pretty much ridiculous to her.

Thankfully we usually have stock only a few months old and when it is significantly older it's usually very cheap. But many chains don't have the same distribution or turnover of seats and that leads to having stock that is over a year old - if it's not put on sale for a price that increases shopping to those particular stores, then it's not going to sell out in time even if production has been stopped...
 

misty073

New member
I guess sometimes I forget that people don't know about carseats... If I was in the market for a new seat I would know about the change and look for a 2012 seat. And your right if someone is paying full price they should be getting what they think they are buying...a new seat that meets safety standards. I was looking at it more from the point of the fact that seats are not unsafe.

I bought a booster on the 29th of dec that was on sale but I knew why and made the choice to buy it. It's too bad the manufacturers were not obligated to take the seats back and exchange them for equal priced compliant seats then the stores wouldn't sell them.
 

snowbird25ca

Moderator - CPST Instructor
I guess sometimes I forget that people don't know about carseats... If I was in the market for a new seat I would know about the change and look for a 2012 seat. And your right if someone is paying full price they should be getting what they think they are buying...a new seat that meets safety standards. I was looking at it more from the point of the fact that seats are not unsafe.

I bought a booster on the 29th of dec that was on sale but I knew why and made the choice to buy it. It's too bad the manufacturers were not obligated to take the seats back and exchange them for equal priced compliant seats then the stores wouldn't sell them.

Here's the question though - if the manufacturer takes the seat back and replaces it, it ultimately penalizes them for what may be bad ordering from the store and bad judgement when the store didn't put them on sale. Should the manufacturer pay the cost for a store having had stock sitting around for a year - stock that could've been clearanced out at least at cost so that they weren't losing money?

I hate to compare Sears to BRU but it's the easiest to compare them to simply because I work at BRU and saw how it was handled from the inside. BRU had a memo out to all stores back in August telling them when the first markdowns would happen. It said right in that initial letter that anything remaining would be continued to be aggressively marked down until stock was gone. I checked our computer at work for all the discontinued items a couple weeks ago - many were zero, some were 1, almost all were less than 20 nation wide and I'd say over half were less than 10 seats. (Keep in mind that some of those numbers would be inventory errors too.) Old Embrace bases were marked down to $9.98 - same with some other bases - they just wanted them gone.

London Drugs knew enough to offer a Turbo Booster at that much of a discount - how could Sears, which sells a lot of baby gear, not know? Instead of losing a little, or breaking even, they're now going to take a loss. Their lack of planning isn't the carseat manufacturer's problem in my honest opinion.

The carseat manufacturer taking the hit would increase the prices on seats across the board. Yeah, maybe a few retailers will end up slightly increasing prices to account for the losses. Or maybe they'll be able to write them off as business losses. But it won't affect those retailers who properly clearanced their stock and were ready for January 1st. I think the onus is squarely on the store's shoulders. When it comes to sales etc, 6 months is a very long time to plan in the world of retail...
 

tam_shops

New member
LD didn't know to discount it. It was on sale for $50, the regular sale price.

It was on the shelf and I asked the Manager to lift it down so I could check the dates and price. When I saw that it was 2010, I reminded him about the 2012 regulations and that he had a few days to clear it out before it had to go into the landfill and he vaguely remembered reading something about that. Then, I asked what the clearance price would be. He called head office and got them to lower the price, I'd probably have grabbed it for a spare if he'd done it then and there, but was home....At any rate, someone else tried at another LD and didn't get anywhere.

So, w/ a little prompting they figured things out, but otherwise, i'd bet it'd still be on the shelf...

As for the New and Better regulations keeping our kids safe, I agree w/ at least 90% of that. The part that gives me a different POV is that some people can't or won't afford a new seat but will buy one off CL. The fact that even poor children deserve to be safe and I now won't sell my seats on CL, even though they are safer than 85% of what I see on CL every time I look. But, the really big one that makes me say, *what ever* is the fact that my not 40# almost 6yo is the ONLY child in his class that is still following the law and in a 5pt harness. He is NOT the only child in that class I can guarantee is under 40#, legal limit. Further, in Pre-school, 3yo & 4yo, he was one of a few kids in 5pt, following the law...So, while I 100% agree this new law is great and I'm thrilled for it and would have liked it to be even stronger than 22# RF (like 2yo), *some* people will simply not follow it, no matter what it says, so why fill our landfill and/or prevent prevent those that can not afford anything better from buying a discounted seat. The new *Law* now says 22# for FF, so it does not matter that my old MA is out there floating around w/ 20#FF on it, some people will follow the law, some won't regardless of what the side of a 2009DOM seat says.

But, really it doesn't matter, the law is you can't sell them, so you can't sell them and *stores* especially should be dealt with b/c give an inch to them and then Graco could go back to making 20#FF GN b/c it was a popular seat and (was it you Trudy?) some people would buy that over Britax that is following the new rules...

tam
 

misty073

New member
People usually look at me like there is something wrong with me because my kids were in a 5pt past 40lbs. If I had a $ for everytime I was told in preschool my son could go in a booster. There are two kids in my daughters kindergarten class that are still in 5pts both are under 40lbs. My daughter was the third but just moved to a booster at 5.5 and 50lbs.

And it really surprises me how many of these little kids go into backless boosters. :(
 

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