Toy Mattel Safety Case

Mattel and Toy Safety Case
1. How did Mattel’s detailed code of conduct fail to detect vendors who used lead paint? What else could the firm have done from a policy/audit standpoint?
Like most contracts and regulation statements, Mattel’s code of conduct has a loophole. The loophole is mainly due to the fact that Mattel, an American company following U.S. regulations, had outsourced theproduction of their toys to China, a country with different regulations and in development process. What this means is that the difference in regulations between both countries could have been the reason why Mattel failed to detect the presence of lead in their products.

At the same time, it was not until June and July of 2007, when both the European Union and American consumer-protectionauthorities started to look into Chinese-made products, and, therefore, forcing China to study the country’s quality standards in search for defaulting products.

This doesn’t mean, however, that Mattel has nothing to be blamed for. When Robert Eckert took over as Mattel’s CEO in 2000, he introduced measures leading to the reduction of costs. These measures included reducing cycle time for the orderingand receiving of goods; measure which increased pressure on Mattel’s Chinese contractor Lee-Der Industrial Company. The urge to reduce costs added to the surplus of pressure taken by the contractor, led to divert attention from the safety and quality standards imposed by the firm, due to the objective of cutting costs.

Moreover, the fact that Mattel trusted its manufacturers and that thesetrusted their suppliers, of whom Mattel had little knowledge, and, therefore, trust, could have also led to a lack of focus on the quality of the products, as they trusted the materials satisfied the standards imposed by authorities and by Mattel.

From a policy/audit point of view, Mattel could have inspected their products twice. Not only should they have integrated a safety and quality controlmanager at each of their factories in China, but they should have also made safety and quality controls at the arrival of the products to U.S. ports or airports. Moreover, they could have made retailers comply to their quality and safety standards, in order for them to communicate as soon as possible an incident with a product.

Mattel should also conduct regular, unannounced audits to theirmanufacturers and suppliers in order to ensure the proper functioning of these companies.

2. Assess Mattel’s performance during the toy recall process. How did the firm do with addressing the concerns of various stakeholders?

Contrarily to the Senate’s opinion, I think Mattel’s performance during the toy recall process was admiring. Robert Eckert, CEO of the company, was careful to inform themedia as soon as they knew what was going on with their products. Moreover, he kept the employees and the media informed on a regular basis, as well as explaining how the company was going to react. They carried out a thorough investigation until they figured out the source of the problems and how to solve them.
The company urged their customers to stop their children from using the affected toysand committed themselves to resolving the problems. Eckert also publicly apologized for the failure and although they weren’t able to change what had been done in the past, they outlined specific steps to change how they worked in the future.
After the investigation, Mattel pressed their retailers to remove affected products from their shelves and intercept incoming shipments, demonstrating thatthe company could be trusted again by acting with diligence and honesty.
Eckert took personal blame of the situation and in my opinion, he took a set of prompt and proactive measures.

On the other hand, however, the apologies to their customers implied a criticism to the Chinese contractors, who were not guilty of the problems related to the small magnets their products carried. So, if in the...