Earlier this morning, Mattel (MAT) announced that its Fisher-Price subsidiary will recall a number of products. The company is recalling certain toddler tricycles, high chairs, a toy vehicle set, and infant toys with inflatable balls.

The Trikes and Tough Trikes toddler tricycles are recalled because of risk of injury if the child hits, sits, or falls upon a toy plastic key. The Healthy Care, Easy Clean, and Close to Me High Chairs are recalled due to the danger of a baby falling against tray storage pegs. Other recalled toys include a toy vehicle set because of choking hazards, and infant toys with inflatable balls because of a choking hazard stemming from valves.

Mattel believes that the cost of these recalls will reduce the full-year 2010 earnings by roughly a penny per share. The costs should be recorded during the third quarter.

The Associated Press reports that another batch of killer toys from China is being recalled. On Wednesday, toys and children's necklaces made in China were recalled, including five more items from the popular Thomas & Friends Wooden Railway product line, because they contain dangerous levels of lead.

Here are the details:

• 23,500 more necklaces, bracelets and pendants imported by TOBY N.Y.C. of New York;
• 850 children's Spinning Wheel Necklace necklaces, produced by Rhode Island Novelty of Cumberland, RI;
• 350,000 Happy Giddy Gardening Tools and Children's Sunny Patch Chairs, imported by Target Corp. (NYSE: TGT) of Minneapolis, MN;.
• 200,000 Thomas and Friends Wood Railway Toys and 800 Britain's "Knights of the Sword" series toys, distributed by RC2 Corp. (NASDAQ: RCRC) of Oak Brook, IL
• 16,000 children's toy rakes imported by Jo-Ann Stores Inc. (NYSE: JAS) of Hudson, OH.
• 10,000 Floor Puppet Theaters produced by Guidecraft Inc., of Englewood, NJ.

Gallery: More toys recalled

Investors in Mattel (NYSE: MAT) can no longer afford to sleep at night. They need to watch for news from China about the next recall of some defective product.

This time it is 775,000 toys with excessive amounts of lead paint. According to The Wall Street Journal the news will be announced tomorrow jointly by the company and the Consumer Product Safety Commission. The CPSC has been highly critical of Mattel for not reporting dangerous defects in a timely fashion. Mattel management is probably wise not to embarrass the federal government in the midst of all its recall problems.

The recalls have to be made. There is clearly no other choice. But, it does continue to raise the question of who is minding the quality control store at the big toy company. It must be someone other than the company management.

Douglas A. McIntyre is a partner at 24/7 Wall St.

Every time investors turn around, things get worse at Mattel (NYSE: MAT). The Wall Street Journal (subscription required) reports that the federal Consumer Product Safety Commission requires companies to "report all claims of potentially hazardous product defects within 24 hours." Mattel apparently has not been doing that. The company took several months to review data on the nearly 18 million play sets that it recalled last month.

The CPSC says that it has had about enough of Mattel's behavior. The commissions chairperson calls Mattel's approach "fallacious and wrongheaded."

Although the commission is fairly small and cannot handle all of the cases that it should, it is astonishing that Mattel would makes its position with consumers worse by adopting a stance that might be viewed as irresponsible.

It's been a few weeks since Mattel, Inc. (NYSE: MAT) announced a million-toy recall, and the dust is far from settled. The Chinese supplier that supplied paint for a huge collection of children's toys has seen its CEO commit suicide and parents are still under the gun on which exact toys to trust their kids with. The problem is lead-based paint, which can lead to health complications. Outside of the normal "small parts" recall fiascos that seem to happen every year, the lead paint issue is a big one. Young kids put everything in their mouths.

This week, Mattel has -- once again -- urged parents to withhold many of its toys from all those curious kids. When a toy manufacturer directly tells customers to not use its products, something is amiss, of course. With more than 19 million toys worldwide under scrutiny, how did this problem become so large before being detected?

Quality control in China -- with raw materials and product manufacturers -- has slid far, far downhill. Retailers carrying items from multiple Chinese-based recalls may be feeling the backlash, and the American consumer is probably going to demand better in the near future. In other words, if "low prices" means "horrible quality," where does that leave discounters like Wal-Mart Stores, Inc. (NYSE: WMT) and Target Corp. (NYSE: TGT)? With plummeting toy sales, most likely. Is that priced into the stock of either retailer? Probably not.