Well, this puts me outta business come February 13th, 2009. If any of you sell clothing/toys/accessories for kids (they define it as 12 and under) you may want to take a peek at this legislation. Basically, ANYONE who sells children's items (bye-bye kidgear on Etsy!) has to submit their product for testing and it includes each component separately. I sew baby slings so I would have to submitted a completed babysling (a unit) for testing for each variation that I do (ETA some changes via the comments). Let's say I sell 10 different fabrics in 10 different sizes. Each SKU number has to be tested so each color in each size have to be tested. That's 100 products that have to be submitted for testing. According to the Fashion-Incubator website tests are $450-$982 for each colorway. Talk about cost prohibitive. Non-compliance with the law can ding you with a 5,000 fine for each offense or jail time if you knowingly sell an item not tested. There is a lot of hubbub about this on another forum and they are all scared crapless that their businesses are going under. There is a lot about this on the Fashion-Incubator website.
Here's the legislation: http://www.cpsc.gov/ABOUT/Cpsia/legislation.html
This does not exclude people who make only one or two items. This does not exclude cloth diaper makers. This does not exclude exporters or importers. It's all of us. Here is a comment from the Fashion-Incubator website that I copied because it really drives the point home. Here's a link to the comment.
Maura said December 5th, 20084:59 pm
I want to add, as an artist and craftsperson who makes one of a kind items (they may be similar in design or use the same pattern, but no two use identical materials). If I were to be able to comply with the requirements, I would have to make two identical items, let’s say dolls, which individually take 5-6 hours to produce, then submit one for destruction in the process of testing. I would then have to work the testing fee into the price of the doll.
That would cause the dolls to cost well over (many times over) what I would charge for them, and would place them outside the reach of most people for a child’s cloth doll.
I think that artisans have simply been forgotten in the process of writing the law.
