Disappointed

Unregistered · Dec 15, 2008

I am extemely disappointed in the lack of leadership by car seat manufacturers and retailers in ters of green initiatives. When you consider the number of car seats used and the forced obsolesence, it is absolutley criminal that car seats are not recycled. All it would take is one manufacturer and one retailer to put a re-cycling program in place and I have to believe that their sales would sky rocket.

emandbri · Dec 16, 2008

I totally agree! It is a shame that in most places there are no options other than a landfill.

SafeDad · Dec 16, 2008

I agree. We could really use a guest blog on the topic, if anyone familiar with plastics and recycling has any insight!

scatterbunny · Dec 16, 2008

Depending on your area, there are carseat recycling programs. Portland, Oregon/Legacy Emmanuel Hospital has one.

vonfirmath · Dec 16, 2008

I'm sorry, manufacturers are already dealing with enough in getting safe seats into our hands that have high limits, I'm not going to go around calling them criminal because they are not touting the "recycling" benefits as well. It would be nice IF... but that's it. IF they could do it without raising prices, as a nice side benefit. Otherwise, let others who care spend their money on it and focus on priority number 1: keeping kids safe in car crashes.

As far as I hear, in many places, recycling costs more than creating from new. Its hard enough to get people to buy car seats at current price points. Making them more expensive will not help the problem.

Victorious4 · Dec 16, 2008

vonfirmath said:
As far as I hear, in many places, recycling costs more than creating from new.

This is true.... Although, my family business uses the same plastic to make post-op prostheses (reduces healing time for amputees by 1/3 comared to traditional casting) . . . we recycle our plastic: the center sends a truck to pick it up & actually pays according to the load weight. They take it away & we never see it again.

The plastic probably wouldn't used to make carseats again (thus nixing the idea that it should have to cost the carseat manufacturers anything) but the plastic could be used again in other ways :thumbsup:

It took a great deal of asking around & even though such prostheses only have a 90 day recommended limit for constant rehabilitative use, as far as I know, we're the only company to recycle our plastic remnants. Sockets that don't sell before we make ease of use improvements are donated to Indian reservations & areas where land mine injuries are common.

skaterbabs · Dec 16, 2008

vonfirmath said:
I'm sorry, manufacturers are already dealing with enough in getting safe seats into our hands that have high limits, I'm not going to go around calling them criminal because they are not touting the "recycling" benefits as well. It would be nice IF... but that's it. IF they could do it without raising prices, as a nice side benefit. Otherwise, let others who care spend their money on it and focus on priority number 1: keeping kids safe in car crashes.

As far as I hear, in many places, recycling costs more than creating from new. Its hard enough to get people to buy car seats at current price points. Making them more expensive will not help the problem.

I agree.

scatterbunny · Dec 16, 2008

Yes, I don't think we should be blaming the carseat manufacturers for no recycling programs; as others have said, that costs money, and isn't really their job to begin with. They tell us what they consider a usable lifespan, we choose what to do with it. We can seek out a recycling program (which do exist, as I pointed out in an earlier post), or we can keep it around for our children to play with in the house, or we can take it to a landfill.

carseatcoach · Dec 16, 2008

scatterbunny said:
Yes, I don't think we should be blaming the carseat manufacturers for no recycling programs; as others have said, that costs money, and isn't really their job to begin with. They tell us what they consider a usable lifespan, we choose what to do with it. We can seek out a recycling program (which do exist, as I pointed out in an earlier post), or we can keep it around for our children to play with in the house, or we can take it to a landfill.

:thumbsup:

I think recycling is important and the mythical "someone" should do something about it.

That doesn't mean it's the manufacturers' responsibility.

tanyaandallie · Dec 16, 2008

chickabiddy said:
:thumbsup:

I think recycling is important and the mythical "someone" should do something about it.

That doesn't mean it's the manufacturers' responsibility.

LOL, on the mythical someone. I think this is a very important issue. I recycle everything I can in my house but something huge like a car seat? No where to take it. I do understand that it's expensive, but imo there is some corporate responsibility that comes with producing a big honking plastic car seat. I LOVE Baby Planet because they recycle strollers! You can send them the stroller and they will either recycle the parts or refurb the stroller and donate to someone who needs it. IMO that is taking your corporate responsibility seriously. Corporations have a responsibility to our earth, just as individual citizens do.

I was reading in my Runner's World magazine a month or so ago that many shoe companies are starting to take enviornmental issues more seriously. There are a few producing enviornmentally friendly running shoes. There are also some that are taking old shoes and recycling the parts or donating the shoes to those in need. I hope one day the same will happen with car seats.

TechnoGranola · Dec 16, 2008

I agree with Tanya. All manufacturers of ANY product need to take responsibility of their products impact on the environment. Manufacturers should be looking for the least toxic way to product items (limit the toxins being released into our air and into employees lungs) and coming up with solutions for product disposal or recycling. The consumer plays their part by following through with the disposal or recycling in the manner recommended by the manufacturer. To say it is all the consumer's responsibility is contributing to all of the crap in the landfills. If there is no way to properly dispose of or recycle items, my choice ends up being to take something to the ladnfill or to not buy it in the first place. Companies don't make money if people don't buy their products.

LISmama810 · Dec 16, 2008

I'm not going to put too much blame on the manufacturers. As someone else pointed out, their #1 goal should be to make kids as safe as possible.

These aren't unnecessary frivolities we're talking about. These are safety devices. Yeah, it would be great to have them made with environmentally friendly products, if possible, but I don't want that to happen at the risk of losing safety.

There ARE companies out there who would love to have the car seats to recycle for their own use/sales, but it's a matter of figuring out who they are. If people checked around in their own communities, I bet there would be some options. (It's something I've been meaning to do for a couple months, but I keep getting sidetracked--my bad.)

Also, if people let their local recycling programs know that they would like to be able to recycle their car seats, maybe those programs would be more open to looking into it.

emandbri · Dec 16, 2008

I see the point you guys are making but honestly there are just so few plastic things that we buy now that can't be recycled it is surprising that car seats are one of them. I check for numbers on all plastic things and I honestly think I only throw away 2 or 3 plastic things away a month because they have no numbers.

tanyaandallie · Dec 16, 2008

I don't think that a company would need to compromise safety in order to provide an enviornmentally friendly product or in order to recycle products they manufacture. Doing something enviornmentally friendly should in no way affect the safety of a product. Companies should always be looking for ways to produce a better product, a safer product, a product that will leave less of an imprint.

Let's be real. Car seat companies make a lot of money. They can afford to put some dollars towards this issue. Perhaps they already do. Yes, their first priority should be safety. That does not mean that they cannot implement a recyling program. Or partner with a charitable organization that can help develop a recyling program. It does not mean they can't hire some R&D folks to look into materials that are more enviornmentally friendly.

LISmama810 · Dec 16, 2008

But the more money they spend on R&D to figure out how to use different products or what to do with their used products, the less money goes to R&D for safety, ease of use features, etc.

Also, the more they pay for things like that, the more the costs gets shoved off onto the consumer.

My understanding with recycling car seats isn't so much that the pieces can't be recycled, but they can't be recycled assembled. In other words, if people wanted to break the car seat down (throw away/reuse the cover and harness, break/take off any metal), they could recycle the individual components. (I'm sure that varies by location, etc.) I believe that Legacy's recycling program employs people to break the car seats down so they can be recycled, but again that takes money, and that money has to come from somewhere.

henrietta · Dec 17, 2008

i thought babyearth.com had a recycle program--you paid the shipping back to them, and they would reward you w/a coupon off a $100 purchase...but now i don't see the info on their site. i was holding onto my expired siv's until i have the money to ship them!

henrietta

christineka · Dec 17, 2008

My community doesn't even have a decent recycling program for regular, household trash type items. I'm rallying for that before I ask to recycle car seats. I'm not sure enough people use them or trash them when expired around here anyway.

I wish more car seat recycling programs were set up around the country though.

henrietta · Dec 17, 2008

Aha!

Found it--here's the link for BabyEarth.com's RENEW program to recycle baby gear:

http://www.babyearth.com/renew

I sent them an email inquiring if they ever give away carseats that are sent to them and to make sure they are aware of the issues surrounding reusing carseats (expirations/after an accident/etc). I've ordered from them before and been very pleased, so hopefully, I will get a positive response this time, too.

henrietta

Victorious4 · Dec 17, 2008

LISmama810 said:
My understanding with recycling car seats isn't so much that the pieces can't be recycled, but they can't be recycled assembled.

I believe that Legacy's recycling program employs people to break the car seats down so they can be recycled, but again that takes money, and that money has to come from somewhere.

Yes, the plastic (the same kind as carseats are made of) which we use to make the post-op prostheses cannot be recycled if metals, etc. are attached. This is why we only recycle the plastic scraps leftover from making the items & any unused/unsellable finished products are donated to nations without adequate resources. The recycling company we use sends someone to pick up the scraps for us & they pay us to do so. It actually costs us more to donate the finished products. However, it would cost more still to pay our employees to stop production in order to disassemble items for recycling (plus then there would be people in other parts of the world without items to help their amputees walk again).

ketchupqueen · Dec 17, 2008

Our local recycle center has a "scrap metal and plastic" bin and will accept them once all foam and fabric are removed. It takes a bit of work but most of the seat CAN then be recycled. :thumbsup: They have volunteers who disassemble them into the metal and plastic pieces and sort them into appropriate batches to be recycled.

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