Bannor Toys are a safety hazard

I first heard about Bannor Toys a couple years ago on Instagram when they collaborated with another baby brand  I follow. I instantly fell in love with Bannor because everything about the company aligned perfectly with all my tastes. They seemed like such a sweet little small business making delightfully adorable "heirloom quality" wooden toys. What was there not to like? I patiently stalked their page and even participated in many of their giveaways and finally went ahead and placed an order when they ran a promotion for black Friday

I ordered their rattle and roll suv baby rattle and personalized it with my son's birth stats and also received a free baby teether. When they finally arrived the items looked adorable and I was super happy with them.

However due to the weight and shape of the rattle my son couldn't really hold or play with it til he was closer to 6 months old. I noticed right away that it was quite a flawed design for a baby rattle, it would only rattle if you shook it in a very specific direction. My son played with it occasionally but it couldn't keep his interest for very long.  But because I loved it so much I kept offering it to him hoping he would grow to like it but he barely used it. One day right after offering it to him, the front wheels came apart suddenly with no warning. I was thankfully sitting with him when it happened. The wheels themselves are choking hazards but the dowel that holds the wheels together is especially dangerous and can cause all sorts of injuries. 

I was genuinely surprised that a brand new wood toy that had barely been played with would fall apart that easily. In my experience wood toys were usually the most durable and were virtually indestructible. I thought it could screw back together but it seemed to have originally been very lightly glued so it was only a matter of time before the rest of it would come apart too.  I reached out to them expecting them to offer a heartfelt apology and try to make things right. Instead they sent me the response below

Their first instinct was to mention that all the vehicles are for age 3+? Even though it was clearly listed as a baby rattle in the infant section of their website? And they had my son's birth stats engraved on it? And since when do 3 year olds play with rattles anyway? I went back to look at my order details and it specifically said baby rattle.

I also went back to review their instagram page and saw several images on their page with young babies clearly under the age of three with the exact same rattle!

I was disgusted by their response and just couldn't wrap my mind around how casually they mentioned the wheels being a choking hazard but still comfortably market the rattles to infants. I went ahead and sent the email anyway and I got an even ruder response by email telling me to send the rattle back to them at my expense and they would repair it and send it back. Again they stressed the point that it was only safe for children over 3 years old. As if that somehow made it okay for the toy to fall apart like that. The wooden dowel was still just as dangerous to a 3 year old anyway. So I told them since I clearly ordered it for an infant I would like a refund. And of course they said no to that. Their warm and fuzzy instagram persona was all a facade because in reality they were just another profit focused business. They were more than happy to endanger children over profits. The bottom line is their products are severely overpriced, low quality and hazardous, they don't stand behind their own marketing and they have no integrity whatsoever. I made a point to report this to the saferproducts.gov to warn other parents out there. Bannor had a choice to respond to that safety report but chose not to. 

For me this was a major learning experience in social media businesses and grasping the idea that all those perfectly curated small businesses could look cute and seem to have great reviews but could potentially be pushing unsafe products. As a society we have to carefully balance supporting small businesses while also holding them accountable. The idea that a small business should be blindly supported regardless can actually be really harmful. We also need to focus a whole lot more on the proven quality of toys over their aesthetic.

I wish you safe shopping!