Toy Safety in Action
• Children under the age of three years cannot be expected to take care of toys during play. They put everything in their mouths for example. They can easily choke on small objects.
• Toys intended for children under three years must not produce small parts, have sharp edges or sharp points or contain harmful chemicals.
• Toy safety is strictly controlled through the European toy safety directive supported by comprehensive European toy safety standards.
• Toys sold on the UK market are checked for compliance by your local trading standards officer.
Tips for Parents
• If you are in any doubt as to where to buy your toys, always go to reputable shops that you know that you can trust.
• Avoid second-hand toys and car boot sales because they are unlikely to be clean or in their original packaging which contains important safety information. Instructions for use will probably have been lost.
• Make sure you read and follow any age-related safety warnings such as ‘not suitable for children under 36 months. Contains small parts.’
• The puzzle you purchased for your school age child could pose a serious risk for baby if she puts the pieces in her mouth. Make sure you keep the older child’s toys separate and if they are out, keep watch that the younger children are not around or can access them.
• Those toys you buy for an older child may not be suitable for younger brothers and sisters. Certain toys need certain skills. Help your older children to find places where they can make models or do chemistry experiments without little ones getting in their way.
• Check the toy box regularly for damaged toys.
• If a broken toy cannot be repaired, throw it away. Do not give the toy to a charity shop or jumble sale. You may be handing on an accident to someone else’s child.
• Make sure that, before giving the toy to your child, you throw away any small parts on packaging - we all know that babies love to play with boxes and many toys come with a lot of packaging and wire ties to hold the toy in place etc. It’s important to recycle packaging out of a child’s reach.
• Tidy up! All the family can be hurt if they fall over toys on the floor, or even worse, the stairs. It’s not easy to be tidy with children about but try to teach them to clear up after playing. Perhaps keep one area of the home for play activities.
Fun Facts
You could fill the seats of Arsenal’s new Emirates stadium 246 times with all the sport-related toys bought in 2005!
There were over 10 million infant toys sold in 2005 so over 22 per new born!
The amount spent on robotic/interactive playmates/pets in 2005 is 60% of the RSPCA’s annual running budget.
The amount of money spent on Doctor Who toys in the first 12 months after release would buy 121 Rolls Royce Phantom (2006 reg’)
If you lined up all the Tamagotchis sold since the 2004 re-launch, they would stretch from the Dartford tunnel to Calais (France)
1.9 million travel games are sold each year, the equivalent of over 3 per caravan
If all the fashion dolls sold in Great Britain in 2005 were holding hands, they would reach from Plymouth to John o’ Groats
It would take 36 hours to go around the M25 at full speed in a slot racing car.
Mr. Potato Head - Hasbro, Inc.
Mr. Potato Head was the first toy product ever advertised on television.
Jenga - Hasbro Games
The creator of Jenga lived in Africa for some years and Swahili was her first language. This is how she came up with the name of her game. Jenga is a Swahili word meaning ‘to build.’
Mr. Potato Head - Hasbro, Inc.
Mr. Potato Head kicked the habit and gave up his pipe in 1987. His decision was honoured with a ceremony at the White House, where he turned his pipe over to the U.S. Surgeon General.
Playing cards
The traditional 52 playing cards in a deck symbolize the number of weeks in a year. The four suits represent the four seasons.
Kites
Kites are named after the kite bird which is a member of the hawk family.
Scrabble - Mattel
Today Scrabble is found in one out of every three American homes.
Slinky - James Industries, Inc.
It takes 63 feet of wire to make a Slinky.
Dice in ancient Egyptian tombs have been found that were made out of bone.
LEGO
The world’s tallest LEGO structure stands at 82 feet in Tallinn, Estonia. More than 6,000 children helped to construct the tower through three days of rain and high winds.
Play-Doh - Hasbro, Inc.
If all the Play-Doh compound made since 1956 was extruded through the Fun Factory, it would make a ‘snake’ that would wrap around the world nearly 300 times.
Playing cards
The most valuable deck of playing cards sold for $143,352 at Sotheby’s in London in 1983. The cards are the oldest complete hand painted set, dating back to 1470.
Teddy Bear
The teddy bear was named after President Theodore (Teddy) Roosevelt following a bear hunt in Mississippi. During the hunt, Roosevelt came upon a wounded young bear and ordered the mercy killing of the animal. The Washington Post printed an editorial cartoon about the hunt depicting the bear as a cuddly cub. The cartoon and story became so well known that teddy bears were soon being mass-produced and turned into a childhood favourite.
Cluedo - Hasbro, Inc.
The game was invented by a British law clerk named Anthony Pratt while walking his beat as a wartime fire warden in Leeds. When the bombs weren’t dropping, friends would gather in each others’ homes for a parlor game called ‘Murder,’ where they would creep around and pretend to murder one of their own. From that game, Pratt developed the idea which turned into the classic board game Cluedo.
POGS - World POG Federation. The game of Pogs was originally played with milk and juice caps. The most popular caps used in this game were a brand of Hawaiian tropical fruit juice known as POG for its ingredients (Passion fruit, Orange, Guava).
Scrabble - Mattel
The highest scoring English word in the game of Scrabble is ‘Quartzy,’ worth 164 points.
Rubik’s Cube - Oddzon Inc./Hasbro Inc.
There are 1,929,770,126,028,800 possible colour combinations on a Rubik’s Cube.