Mattel Case Study Response

The company Mattel is a toy empire which produces some of the most popular children’s toys such as Barbie and Elmo. Traditionally, Mattel has been praised for being one of the best corporate citizens and showing magnificent social responsibility, but in recent history, this has not been the case. Mattel went through a period of turmoil and government backlash which arose in 2001 and yet again in 2007 when they produced millions of unsafe toys. Mattel ignored clearly understood guidelines set by the Consumer Product Safety Commission (CPSC) multiple times in this period and later tried to save their public image by blaming manufacturers overseas. It seems as if Mattel briefly lost sight of values such as honesty and beneficence. Losing sight of such important values is unacceptable for a company that manufactures products and has a responsibility to parents and most importantly, young children. Throughout the 2000s Mattel’s public image was declining for many reasons but they have taken steps to regulate their foreign factories and trying to once again be a socially responsible company.

When faced with recalls that totaled over 21 million units, Mattel delayed action. Mattel knew of the unsafe toys that had been produced in China and took over a month and a half to have recalls. Safety issues involving items such as toys have a mandatory 24 hour window to be reported, Mattel clearly disrespected this regulation. One important ethical fault made by this delay is taking away consumer autonomy. A consumer only has true autonomy when both parties know exactly what is being bought and what is being sold. In this case, Mattel knew that the toys contained hazardous levels of lead paint and that the magnets were of a harmful size to child...

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...ively strong standards that they plan to continue. These standards include the creation of the Corporate Responsibility Division which consists of over 500 worldwide employees that watch over all vendors and manufacturers. Also, every batch of paint is tested and there has been an increase in unannounced testing and inspections of plants and toys. What might just be most impressive is that a toy is tested from every batch Mattel manufacturers produce. These standards placed a keen eye on their outsourced manufacturers and this is what I believe needed to be done. With standards like this in place, a repeat of the recalls talked about is going to be very rare.

It is just up to Mattel to not get complacent and not forget the mistakes of their past. Mattel must continue to be proud of their name but more importantly fully understand their responsibilities to families.