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Hasbro (NYSE: HAS) is again recalling about 1 million of its Easy-Bake Ovens due to a design flaw that puts children at risk of getting their fingers caught in the oven door and suffering burns. Not to make light of the situation, but I'm a little stunned that an Easy-Bake Oven is able to burn anyone. This is a child's toy that cooks brownies and miniature cakes -ever-so-slowly - with a light bulb, after all. Then again, I also hated the Snoopy snow-cone maker - also made by HAS - which just basically seemed like sugar water poured over ice cubes.
As a little girl interested in cooking, I much preferred to just help my mom out in the real kitchen. But I was just one odd child, and the sensibly priced Easy-Bake brand (currently about $25) has been popular among both boys and girls for four decades.
Hasbro first issued a voluntary recall in February, supplying a repair kit to address the problem. In the subsequent months, however, there have been almost 250 reports of children getting their hands caught in the oven door, 77 of whom were burned as a result and one of whom suffered the partial amputation of a finger.
The U.S. Consumer Product Safety Commission said today that toys purchased before May 2006 were not affected. The defective toys were on shelves at Toys 'R' Us, Wal-Mart Stores (NYSE: WMT), and Target (NYSE: TGT), among other locations.
The venerable product should no longer be available. Customers who already own an Easy-Bake Oven can contact the company at 1-800-601-8418 to receive details on how to proceed with a return and receive a voucher for another Hasbro product.
Beth Gaston Moon is an analyst at Schaeffer's Investment Research.
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Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)
7-19-2007 @ 6:14PM
Lisa said...
I don't see the need for a recall either--you would have to be an exceptionally dimwitted child to jam your fingers into the hot area of the device for any reason.
I had an E-Z Bake oven in the mid 1960's, and it would probably be considered lethally dangerous by today's standards. The only problem I ever encountered with it was my interfering mother, who INSISTED that cakes could be made more cheaply and efficiently in a REAL oven, with her taking over the whole process. And that wasn't the POINT. The POINT was to make it yourself in this strange contraption, and to eat the admittedly rather awful results.
Perhaps we should return to more dangerous toys for children--that way the gratuitously stupid ones stood a chance of being removed from the gene pool before they bred. The kids who survived 1960's chemistry sets, E-Z bake ovens, those things that made rubber spiders, model rockets and lawn darts developed enough sense to avoid adult stupidity. Their offspring, unimpeded by similar dangers, simply moved on to starring in videos of trampoline and skateboard accidents on America's Funniest Home Videos. And we wonder why our health costs are skyrocketing?
If I could survive a 1965 chemistry set as a six-year-old, and my little brother survived Erector Sets, real tool kits and assorted electronics components my father brought us during the same time frame, then there really isn't much reason to get so wound up about today's E-Z-Bake oven. We both still have all our fingers and toes, unburnt and undamaged by shrapnel. I moved on to a career in the life sciences; my little brother became a fountains/special effects/set/lighting/sound designer and builder.
7-20-2007 @ 7:57AM
jim said...
I agree, Easy-Bake ovens have been selling like hot
cakes for decades, so why are these kids (now) getting
their pinkies burned? Are the kids today less smarter
than they were years ago? Hmmm, maybe.
7-20-2007 @ 8:42AM
3kids1tiredmom said...
I don't think that the kids aren't as smart, it's the parents that aren't paying attention. I mean, Where are the parents - it plainly says 'use under adult supervision'. I am sorry that kids got hurt, but just because it's a toy, that doesn't mean kids can use it on their own.
7-20-2007 @ 12:10PM
jenkins said...
Every one of these items has a statement on the packaging to use with adult supervision. Where are the parents when the child is using something that gets hot? Shouldn't the parents be supervising the ovens until the child understands the proper use?
When I was a child, I had a easy bake oven. One day I used it when mom was not home, guess what? I got a burn on my fingers! I never told mom about this, but you can bet I was cautious after that when around a toy or real stove.
Parents need to take responsility for their childs learning right from wrong and safe from dangerous.