Seller Beware

Ken Cavallo — Mon, 08 Feb 2010 22:59:10 +0000

Recalls are a dime a dozen these days. People simply don’t tolerate dangerous products, defective products, or anything else that would keep them from working as expected. In the past, companies generally did their best to make safe products. But many also cared little about the potential hazards of their goods once on the market. They assumed that as long as consumers used common sense, there would be no danger. For example, one would have to be pretty stupid to eat paint chips. Therefore it isn’t a big deal if there is lead or arsenic in the paint, or so they thought. Nowadays we hold our companies and products to a higher standard. We expect them to anticipate potential misuse of their products and warn us about it. Not only that, but if a certain misuse of a product becomes too common, we expect them issue a fix, at their own expense. This exact thing happened to Graco recently, who had to recall 1.5 million strollers from retailers due to a potentially dangerous hinge. People were getting their hands caught in the hinge and there were some reports of severed fingers. I can think of many items in my household that, if I stuck my fingers in the hinge, would ruin my day very quickly. But Graco saw the cost of this consumer mistake as too high for its own good, and had to issue a massive recall.

This presents a stern warning to small business owners who produce goods for their customers. Make sure your stuff is safe! This might sound like common sense, but it is not enough anymore to assume your customers will use your products properly. You need to anticipate potential misuses of your products and plan/design accordingly. Put safety warnings on packaging. Build in safe-guards and use components that will work the way they were designed for the life of the product. Don’t put your company in a position of having to fend off angry customers and negative publicity. Don’t subject your company to the expense and embarrassment of having to go to retailers, hat-in-hand, and replace their inventory. And don’t expose your products to government mandated recalls, or worse, the dreaded L-word. You know the word I’m talking about. As a small business, you may not have the resources to come back after a recall crisis the way we’ve seen some giant corporations do. Bottom line: if you make cars, don’t build them with a sticky accelerator pedal that forces you to completely halt the sale of over half your product line and over 2.3 million vehicles across the country. Ahem…Toyota.

May 9th 2009 – “Think and Grow Rich”

Noel Garwick — Tue, 28 Jul 2009 22:47:50 +0000

June 20th, 2009 – “Women Entrepreneurs”

Noel Garwick — Tue, 28 Jul 2009 22:34:29 +0000

June 13th, 2009 – “Business Security”

Noel Garwick — Tue, 28 Jul 2009 22:26:29 +0000

Podcasts

Kevin Schmidt — Mon, 06 Apr 2009 23:23:37 +0000

March 21, 2009
Government Regulations

April 4, 2009
Mind Your Business – Management

Owl Radio » Business 101 with Jeff Packer

Seller Beware

May 9th 2009 – “Think and Grow Rich”

June 20th, 2009 – “Women Entrepreneurs”

June 13th, 2009 – “Business Security”

Podcasts