Episode #13 - Importing Toys - All the 'legal stuff' you need to know (EN71, CE, UL, CPSC Etc!

Christmas is just around the corner, and you might be thinking about adding some toys that you've imported from China to your inventory.

Welcome to the E Commerce Freedom Podcast with your host, Oliver Denier. Learn the practical steps you need to take to build a business you can run on your own terms. Escape the 9 to 5 and work from anywhere in the world.

Hey, how's it going? It's Oli here. Very, very warm welcome to another episode of the Ecommerce Freedom podcast. So in today's episode, what I wanted to focus on is all that legal stuff you need to think about if you're going to be importing toys. So obviously we're coming up to Christmas time now. It's really not that far away, especially if you're running an E commerce business. You know, Christmas is just around the corner and you might be thinking about adding some toys that you've imported from China to your inventory. So that's why I thought now would be the perfect time to actually make an episode about this. Also, I'm teaching at the moment, hundreds of clients at a time. Like, I've actually taught thousands of people how to sell on Amazon over the past couple years, but right now I actually have, like, hundreds of clients. And these guys, they sell in all different categories. And recently, quite a few of my clients have started to sell toys, and it's been a learning process for me. Toys isn't one of my main categories, especially toys for, like, kids. I've sold more adult toys, such as things like I've sold a set of dominoes, poker sets, stuff like that, but nothing really for kids. So I've had to learn all of this stuff so I can help my clients abide by all the regulations. So I want you to stay safe. I don't want you to get into any legal trouble when you're importing stuff, and I want you to have a good general idea of how this stuff works. However, before we get into this, just remember I'm not a lawyer. This isn't like legal advice or anything. And if you're in doubt, and I'll reiterate this at the end of the episode, if you're in doubt about any of these regulations, then please do just go hire a legal professional to help you. Because paying, you know, a couple hundred dollars, a couple hundred pounds just to consult with a lawy for an hour or two could save you thousands in lawsuits if something were to go wrong further down the line. Okay, so before you make a big decision on importing a load of toys, then, then do check this stuff. But before, before you do that, I thought I'd give you a brief introduction. So if you want to sell toys in the UK or in the eu, at the moment they're one of the same. Or in the USA or in Canada, there's different regulations for every country. Okay. Depending on where you want to sell, the laws are going to be different. Now, obviously toys are used by kids, right? And we're talking about specifically toys that will be marketed towards children under the age of 14, so not teenagers, but very young kids. Toys are going to. Kids are going to be playing with these toys all the time. You know what kids are like throwing them against the wall, putting them in mouth, jumping about on them. These toys have to be safe. It's understandable why there would be laws around toys. If a kid puts a toy in his mouth and it's got some kind of toxic material in, could go very, very bad for that kid, right? Or if they've got very, very small parts which break off and they become sharp, you know, all kinds of accidents could happen. So I totally understand why these regulations are in place. As an importer, it actually starts to become a little bit complicated. So depending on where you're based, the rules are going to be slightly different. So I'm going to go through each area and the one that applies to you every wherever you want to import toys. Hopefully you'll have a slightly better idea by the end of this episode. So let's start off with where I'm from. I'm from the uk, so at the moment the UK is part of the eu, right? It's going to be another year or so until they separate. But right now it's all the same. And to be honest with you, once the EU leaves the the UK leaves the eu, the laws might not change. We don't really know exactly what's going to happen yet, but I'm going to tell you how this stuff works right now whilst we're still part of the eu. And then if you want to sell stuff across Europe, then the same thing applies as well if you want to use pan European FBA and things. So to sell toys in the EU you need to abide by the EN71 toys directive. So this EN71 regulation essentially is a certificate that you can get that proves that your toy has been tested. So a safety assessment will be carried out of this toy usually happens in a lab or maybe in some kind of third party company can carry this out for you. And what they'll do is they'll carry out a load of tests to make sure it's safe. So your manufacturer most of the time will actually sort this out for you. So before you purchase any quantity of a toy, make sure you ask your manufacturer if they have the EN71 certificate for that particular toy. Also, there's another, another One called the EN62115 which is similar to the EN71, but this is specifically for electronic toys. So if your toy, you know, has an on button, it takes batteries, then it has to be tested and it has to have this certificate to prove that it's safe. Okay, so either one of those for your toy, also it needs to have a CE mark. Now a CE mark is kind of the same, it's kind of in the same ballpark as the EN71. Again, it proves that it's been tested for EU safety. And the CE mark needs to either appear on the toy itself or on the packaging that the toy is sold inside. Okay, so this is, this is important stuff. And actually if your product doesn't have the CE marking visible, then usually it won't even go through customs. So you want to ask your manufacturer to make sure that that's on there, make sure that it's all been carried out and the toy passes all of those tests. So if you want to find out more about what the CE marking is, then you can go to CE marking.com and there's loads of awesome information on there, exactly what the marking is and how you can get it for your product and whether you need it at all. So your supplier should have already carried out the tests for the particular product design before it gets manufactured in bulk. They can even do it on their premises or they can send it to a lab to get tested. So that's the UK and eu. Okay, that's a very basic overview of how this stuff works. You can actually see a lot more in depth information about this if you go to gov.uk and then just type in EN71 or just type in toy manufacturers. You can get a whole breakdown of all the different types of toys, the safety assessments needed, how the CE item works and everything else. But I wanted to give you like an overview so just so you're aware of this stuff. Because it can be pretty bad if you, if you're not aware, if you import a bunch of stuff and it doesn't even go through customs or you're selling a product that isn't tested and their child has a problem and you know that would be a horrible situation. As well. So that's the UK and eu. Next I want to cover usa. So to import products from China to the usa, they have to meet standards from the Consumer Product Safety Commission. This is the American board who look after all this stuff, right? They try and keep kids safe by making these laws and making these certificates. And the one that you want to pay attention to in the US is called ASTM and F963. And in America this regulation applies to toys that are marketed for use for kids under the age of 12. Right. So any toy that's going to be used by a kid under the age of 12 needs to have this third party testing and needs to have this certificate to be legal for sale. Also in addition to that, just like the CE marking that's available in the eu, you'll need a UL marking in the usa. So as far as I'm aware, the UL marking isn't actually a legal requirement. However, it's very, very advisable to have it displayed on your product because it just proves to the customer that your product has passed that certification and it's a good quality product. So we covered EU and uk, we covered usa. Finally, I want to give you a brief introduction to how this stuff works in Canada. So in Canada it's a little bit different. Again, your toy has to abide by the Hazardous Products act and specifically the toy section of that Hazardous Products Act. So there's a slightly different certification that you can get for Canada has to abide by the ISO IEC 17025 legislation. And again you can get it tested by a third party company to make sure it abides by this. And in Canada this whole legislation is managed by the ccpsc. Alright? So the Canadian version of the Consumer Product Safety Commission. So if you want to find more information about the rules in Canada, then go to Canada CA and type toy safety requirements and you'll find a breakdown of all the things that you need in order to import toys that meet all of the legal requirements. So I've given you a lot of information in this episode so far. It's really dry, it's really boring, but I really wanted to make sure you guys were aware of this stuff. If you're going to be importing toys, please don't just try and import anything and try and sell it because you could get into a lot of trouble. So, so definitely check that you are understanding these requirements. So here's the bottom line. Before you decide to import a toy, ask your supplier if the product meets the regulations in your Specific country. Okay, so go back through this episode, listen to the requirements that I've listed, and ask the supplier if they can provide a certificate and the required markings for the country you want to sell the product in. If there's any uncertainty surrounding this, then just don't import the product. Just go and find a supplier who is certain who does have the certificate, who has carried out all of the safety tests and everything. Because it could happen that your stuff won't even get through customs if you can't prove that your products are safe. So again, like I said in the beginning of the episode, definitely go contact a legal advisor to help you with this stuff. Before you import a product, spend, you know, a couple hundred dollars, speak to them for an hour or two, tell them about the product that you're going to be importing, give them all the details. They will be able to tell you specifically what you need to get the best way to prepare for when you want to import these toys. Now, another thing you want to do is when you get hold of the certificate for your toy, hold onto it. Hold on to information about your manufacturer, because if anything were to go wrong, it's unlikely. But you would need to present those documents in the future. So hopefully this information has been helpful for you. I know it's not the most exciting episode in the world, but it's important and I want you guys to be successful. I don't want you to get into trouble. So I thought I would just tell you the little knowledge I have about this topic so you can go and dive deeper online and find more info out there. Now, as a bonus, if you want to be really careful with all this stuff, I'd always recommend getting product liability insurance. You can have a look online for a company or help you with products you've imported for China, getting liability insurance on them. So if any issues arise with one of your customers, then you're covered for those fees as well. At the end of the day, I really don't want you to worry about this stuff. It's all just precautions, really. It's nothing you should be freaking out about. Definitely shouldn't disrupt you from hitting your goals. I just want you to be aware of it. Awesome. Okay, so if you want to get the show notes for this episode, the transcript, if you want to see a list of resources that I've put down there for you, go to ecommercefreedom.com 13 that's ecommercefreedom.com 13. You'll find a load of resources there to help you with all of this boring legal stuff for importing toys. Loads of more information on there as well. And obviously there's tons of links and stuff on my site to help you with all aspects of your Amazon business. So go to ecommercefreedom.com 13 to check it all out. Thank you so much for listening. I hope you've enjoyed this episode, hope it's been helpful, and I'll see you next week.