Latest / Best of Business / Jeremy Kirksmith: Planet Fun CEO on the changing safety standards for children's toys

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Jeremy Kirksmith: Planet Fun CEO on the changing safety standards for children's toys · Best of Business

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  Speaker 1: You're listening to a podcast from News talksed be follow
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  Speaker 1: Ever do for ce Ellen.
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  Speaker 2: Nine nine two is the text number. Oh, we're going
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  Speaker 2: to talk to the chap from Taller. Henry from Taller
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  Speaker 2: who had the big salm worn flag out last night.
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  Speaker 3: It was awesome.
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  Speaker 2: He's with us Quarter Pas five. Now David Seymour has
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  Speaker 2: brought his war on red tape the toy industry. The
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  Speaker 2: government is going to recognize the toy standards of the
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  Speaker 2: US and the EU, which means that any toy that
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  Speaker 2: is compliant in those two markets, the US and the EU,
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  Speaker 2: will now also be automatically compliant to New Zealand. Jeremy
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  Speaker 2: Kirksmith is the CEO of major toy distributor Planet Fun.
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  Speaker 2: Andy's with us.
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  Speaker 3: Oh, Jeremy, Hi, how are y?
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  Speaker 2: I'm very well? Thank you? You must be starting with.
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  Speaker 3: This, ah, common sense. It's just so smart about time.
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  Speaker 2: Mate, You actually sound slightly relieved.
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  Speaker 3: You know, we import about fifteen hundred different toys a year,
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  Speaker 3: different skews, as we call it, and we we have
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  Speaker 3: to have separate testing for every single skew because so
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  Speaker 3: many of our standards are different to everywhere else on
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  Speaker 3: the planet. There's what, you know, eight and a half
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  Speaker 3: billion people on this planet and New Zealand has five million.
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  Speaker 3: But we have special standards just for us. And suddenly
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  Speaker 3: it's like, no, we can level the playing field and
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  Speaker 3: realize that we while we're different, we are special, we're
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  Speaker 3: quite similar to the rest of the world and we
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  Speaker 3: can go with those standards everywhere.
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  Speaker 2: Is it true that making one of those toys compliant
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  Speaker 2: with New Zealand or just testing that it was compliant
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  Speaker 2: would cost up to five thousand dollars for a skew.
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  Speaker 3: It can do And that's because you know, if we
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  Speaker 3: have to have special product for New Zealand to make
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  Speaker 3: it compliant, then it would be a special production run.
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  Speaker 3: On the other side of it, what we do is
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  Speaker 3: if we can't get it compliant, most of the time,
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  Speaker 3: we just don't bring it in. And you know, there's paints,
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  Speaker 3: there's cosmetics, there's crayons, there's all sorts of stuff that
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  Speaker 3: is just different. And you know, while while we're important,
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  Speaker 3: we're not that special. And there's a point where they
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  Speaker 3: were making you know, we were testing for different minerals
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  Speaker 3: and different things and products that are below trace level,
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  Speaker 3: which means that these are naturally occurring in nature and
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  Speaker 3: yet we are not allowed it in our product at all.
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  Speaker 2: Okay, does this mean that there is a chance that
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  Speaker 2: we're going to bring in stuff that is going to
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  Speaker 2: hurt the kids?
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  Speaker 3: No?
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  Speaker 2: Sloppy in the EU and the US.
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  Speaker 3: No. And look, I would say particularly the EU have
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  Speaker 3: really really good standards, very high, and they still need
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  Speaker 3: to firm whether it is the US or the EU
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  Speaker 3: because they are different standards. So I will need to
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  Speaker 3: clarify that that if they said the EU, that would
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  Speaker 3: be perfect. That would be the middle ground for me.
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  Speaker 3: That would make it totally sensical and make our lives
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  Speaker 3: so much easier and so much I'd say clearer.
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  Speaker 2: Could it not be that we comply with both at
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  Speaker 2: the same time?
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  Speaker 3: Time, they are different, so you would need to either
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  Speaker 3: go to I'll call it the lowest common denominator and
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  Speaker 3: decide what that is because they are different, so that
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  Speaker 3: they need to make a ruling and decide what it is.
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  Speaker 2: Okay, Well, what I mean by that if is if
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  Speaker 2: they if the US is this, these toys over here
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  Speaker 2: are compliant, and the euses these toys over here a compliant.
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  Speaker 2: Doesn't that mean that we actually get both sets of toys,
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  Speaker 2: like you can comply with both at the same time. Okay?
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  Speaker 3: Cool?
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  Speaker 2: Now, does this mean that all of a sudden we're
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  Speaker 2: going to get some crazy, cool new toys in this country?
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  Speaker 3: I don't know if we'll get a whole lot of new,
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  Speaker 3: crazy toys that are that different that. I'll tell you what.
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  Speaker 3: It's going to save us a lot of money, a
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  Speaker 3: lot of time, a lot of heartache, and a lot
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  Speaker 3: of red tape.
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  Speaker 2: Cool. Are they going to get cheaper?
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  Speaker 3: Probably not, you know, that's sort of the thing that's
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  Speaker 3: built in. But we can certainly move a lot quicker.
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  Speaker 2: Good on you, Jeremy, Enjoy the moment, because it's not
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  Speaker 2: often you get worse like this in your life.
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  Speaker 3: No, it's not, it's not. It's just it's fantastically can't work.
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  Speaker 2: Good on you, Jeremy Kirksmith, Planet fun CEO. Yay, How
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  Speaker 2: good is that? How good is that? Didn't that that
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  Speaker 2: just make you feel better about the world that somebody
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  Speaker 2: just got a great win? Yeah, I'm I'm deep in
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  Speaker 2: the toys at the moment, as you can understand.
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