This panel discussion is intended to provide practical advice from manufacturers. Representatives from diverse industries will talk about some of the challenges they anticipate facing in the near future and the solutions they have developed and are implementing to better meet those challenges.
In 2018, consumer products are more innovative than ever, with new features and new functionality, being introduced every day. In many cases, these products represent novel combinations of features that haven't been seen in the marketplace. As more functionality and features are sewn-in or bolted-on to products, we may be creating a greater potential for problems in terms of consumer health and safety or the environment. The ever increasing pressure to shorten the product development time line also adds to the difficulty in fully evaluating product risks.
The panel will share best practices and insight on how to capitalize on this innovation, while managing product safety, testing and regulatory implications and protecting consumers, as well as your company and brand’s reputation.
The session will emphasize practical take home points and the use of specific case examples to illustrate concepts that could otherwise be abstract. We will reserve at least 20 minutes for interactive discussions with the audience.
No matter how recall effectiveness is measured or defined, the goal of getting a recalled product out of homes should be a primary goal. However, today’s consumers expect speed and ease – especially Millennials and Gen Z - and in fact may even prefer, during a recall, to interact with chatbots to accomplish their daily tasks, product purchases, and receive company and personal communications.
We will discuss recalls that had high and low consumer response rates. We will discuss the factors that could have caused those differences. Research on communication and behavioral trends will be shared with the audience including demographics and lifestyle data of customers and their preferences. We will hear from marketing experts and safety and recall experts who can provide insight into these issues and discuss whether companies should have different strategies to reach different consumer populations.
In a fast paced consumer landscape, speed – of technology, innovation, and progress – is driving change in how businesses design, manufacture, and distribute their products. As this acceleration creates new and exciting cutting-edge technologies and braves the status quo, companies and consumer product safety authorities are encountering ever increasing unknowns.
How can we know and/or test that ground-breaking ideas and designs are safe in practice? What will happen when these novel products enter the market and how quickly will they expand globally? When and how can we as industry and regulators come together throughout an original product’s lifecycle? What new partnerships are needed – in research and development, patents, and entrepreneurship – to help us learn and understand the potential risks before they go to market?
These questions and more will be the genesis for dialogue between industry and regulators as we discuss new tools (trend analysis, social media analytics, standards and design), existing approaches (general provisions, recalls, and outreach), and best practices for tackling these evolving opportunities and challenges. Representing a synthesis of industry, legal, and regulatory representatives, this panel will provide insights and examples of how to mitigate risks, adapt decision-making processes, and best strive together towards safe products.
Great opportunity and potential exists for the international product safety community to learn from each other’s best practices and data analysis. This session is meant to be a framework to open the dialogue among representatives from trade associations, standard setting bodies and relevant agencies, so that positive steps can be made toward global standards alignment. Dialogue with a panel who is operating in this space and working to achieve those objectives will facilitate attendee understanding and implementation of identifying steps that need to be taken in their own segments.
Information about product safety issues can circle the globe in an instant. This interactive panel presentation will explore the ways in which information technology and social medial have changed consumer’s expectations as to the safety and quality of consumer products and what can be expected in the future. Participants in this session will gain an understanding of the impact that information technology and social media have had on changing consumer expectations for product safety and the ability to use this understanding to prepare for and proactively address consumer expectations for product safety and quality in the future.
As more is learned about the chemical substances consumers interact with in the products they use in their daily lives, the definition of safe product evolves at an increasing rate. Nowhere is this more pronounced than in the regulation of children’s product and, more specifically, those regulations implemented at the state-level. The panel will review a broad range of state-level chemical disclosure requirements, state-level efforts toward alignment, industry efforts aimed at satisfying competing requirements and manufacturing control programs employed by individual manufacturers focused on reducing the potential need to report in the first place.
There are countless examples on social media of people promoting the misuse of products, from clothes baskets used as baby baths to toothpick crossbows. Our panel will discuss specific cases of product misuse promoted by social media and the steps to help shut it down in order to limit the impact on consumer safety and your brand.
All agree that the consumer products landscape has changed forever. To remain competitive, innovative companies are replacing entire categories of products and compressing the speed and time to market. Regulations, standards and databases for new product categories do not exist, forcing companies to rethink how they design and manufacture safe products. Following a brief recap of the panel's work distilling the issues presented by compressed speed to market, the panel will present alternative approaches to address product safety in the Exponential Age. Audience participation will be facilitated and encouraged!
