Kids In Danger Expands the KID Design Safety Toolkit with New Category-Specific Courses

In July 2022, Kids In Danger (KID), a leading nonprofit organization dedicated to protecting children by fighting for product safety, introduced the KID Design Safety Toolkit to provide developers of children’s products with a free online tool to help create a safety mindset when embarking on new product development or when marketing those products.

KID recently expanded the Toolkit with the release of four new courses featuring masterclasses led by industry experts. The new courses take a deeper dive into how to create and design products more safely in the four key areas of children’s products.

1. PLAY – includes not just toys but other products that end up in children’s hands for play
2. SLEEP – critical because it is the only time infants are intended to be left alone
3. AT HOME – covers all other product categories used in the home, such as furniture, bath and feeding
4. OUT & ABOUT – those products and playthings that are used when the family is outside or away from home

Leading experts in each area share their design knowledge and expertise. Here are a few of our engaging and insightful masterclass experts:

• Gretchen Yehl (MS), experienced child development researcher in the toy industry, shares insights about how child development and the realities of parental supervision impact safe use of products and how testing early and often can help you mitigate and prevent risks.
• Kari Danek (PhD, MBA), an expert in mechanical design and human factors, offers details on how the interaction between human (kids and parents), machine (children’s products), and the environment can cause unexpected problems, and what to look out for to avoid these problems and design for safety.  
• Pediatrician Dr. Rachel Moon (MD, FFAP) focuses on the importance of safe sleep and shares critical information on how infant physiology impacts their interaction with sleep products as well as non-sleep products in which babies happen to fall asleep.
• Erin Mannen (PhD), Director of the Boise Applied Biomechanics of Infants Laboratory (BABI Lab), shares research about infant musculoskeletal development and how these biometrics impact the safety of baby gear.
• Keith Rhoades, product safety engineer and “myth-buster,” helps us identify and mitigate hazards across a broad range of children’s products categories.

“We are thrilled to launch these four new courses to expand our Design Safety Toolkit,” states Nancy Cowles, executive director for KID. “The caliber of expertise provided by the people behind each course is unparalleled, and we are so grateful to have support from global leaders in children’s product safety. The first phase of the KID Design Safety Toolkit has been well-received, and we look forward to adding this next level of information across key children’s product areas.”

While no one sets out to design a product that puts our most vulnerable consumers—infants and children—at risk, each year tens of thousands of kids are injured and hundreds die in incidents associated with infant and children’s products. Many entrepreneurs and organizations have great ideas or a clear vision of the need from their own experiences but aren’t skilled in product safety or child development. On top of that, they may not have all the resources needed to ensure product safety once their products are in the home and in real-world use. Providing a resource for these businesses and entrepreneurs was the impetus behind the creation of the Toolkit.

The new courses are add-ons to the original Toolkit which is a general design safety course. Original Toolkit topics include understanding consumer behavior in the real world, designing and manufacturing safety, the role of market research, marketing with an eye towards safety, and age grading based on developmental considerations. Spanish and Mandarin subtitles are now available for the general Toolkit course. Both the original Toolkit and the new courses are available free of charge. Learn more and register for the KID Design Safety Toolkit here.

Special thanks to our partners who helped fund the creation of this invaluable resource. Major funding was provided by Amazon. Additional funding was provided by BreathableBaby, ASTM International, Etsy, and QIMA. Read our full contributors list here, including the advisory committee and expert course speakers.