Pieces of Peace of Minds EVERYWHERE
So in the exploration of the Baby Industrial Complex or BIC (thanks Ike for the term) I have discovered that apparently that everyone sells not just products, but peace of mind. If I get the Graco imonitor I get peace of mind. If I get the Britmax car seat I get peace of mind. The Baby Bjorn--peace of mind. The Graco Pack n Play--you guessed it--peace of mind.
But here is the weird thing, they have all been selling peace of mind for YEARS, even though according to the recalls and their own literature their current products are VASTLY safer now than before. So are the people that bought the old items in possession of smaller or fewer pieces of peace of mind than those that buy the current offerings?
A friend of mine from work, Steve, has two daughters and he, like me, is a research person. He was intent on finding the very best car seat and bought a Britmax with "side impact" protection. This was for Emily, who is now 5. Last year he had another child, Alice, and again did research. Come to find out, Emily's Britmax had only side impact protection while Alice's now has TRUE side impact protection. So for all of these years Emily has been riding around in FALSE side impact protection and Steve and his wife never knew. When he realized this, did he just lose all of the pieces of peace of mind he gained when he purchased Emily's seat? That is scary.
Then there is this statistic: if you compare JUST SIDS deaths, a baby is roughly FIFTY times more likely to be killed by a crib than a tiger. Estimates place tiger deaths at around 60 a year. SIDS deaths in America alone top out at around 3000 a year. So based on numbers alone a crib is 50 times more dangerous than a tiger if you are a baby. It seems so counterintuitive, what with babies being defenseless and all, while tigers are ravenous clawed carnivores, but the statistics and the BIC just CAN'T be lying.
Based on this information I am now researching tigers for Peanut to sleep on. Perhaps they sell some that come with peace of mind. And if size matters, then how about a liger? That is a LOT of pieces of peace of mind.
But here is the weird thing, they have all been selling peace of mind for YEARS, even though according to the recalls and their own literature their current products are VASTLY safer now than before. So are the people that bought the old items in possession of smaller or fewer pieces of peace of mind than those that buy the current offerings?
A friend of mine from work, Steve, has two daughters and he, like me, is a research person. He was intent on finding the very best car seat and bought a Britmax with "side impact" protection. This was for Emily, who is now 5. Last year he had another child, Alice, and again did research. Come to find out, Emily's Britmax had only side impact protection while Alice's now has TRUE side impact protection. So for all of these years Emily has been riding around in FALSE side impact protection and Steve and his wife never knew. When he realized this, did he just lose all of the pieces of peace of mind he gained when he purchased Emily's seat? That is scary.
Then there is this statistic: if you compare JUST SIDS deaths, a baby is roughly FIFTY times more likely to be killed by a crib than a tiger. Estimates place tiger deaths at around 60 a year. SIDS deaths in America alone top out at around 3000 a year. So based on numbers alone a crib is 50 times more dangerous than a tiger if you are a baby. It seems so counterintuitive, what with babies being defenseless and all, while tigers are ravenous clawed carnivores, but the statistics and the BIC just CAN'T be lying.
Based on this information I am now researching tigers for Peanut to sleep on. Perhaps they sell some that come with peace of mind. And if size matters, then how about a liger? That is a LOT of pieces of peace of mind.