Image: The Reading Nook
Disney is offering a DVD upgrade or moneyback guarantee to everyone who purchased a Baby Einstein DVD between June 5, 2004 and September 4, 2009 (the day the notice was put out).
The recall, if you want to call it that, came about after interest groups pressured the company to offer parents a refund. The premise: Time in front of a TV screen is bad for babies. An FTC complaint convinced Disney to rescind an earlier claim that Baby Einstein DVDs were educational.
Since September, interest groups have claimed a further victory in persuading the company to offer consumers a refund. Details of the Baby Einstein recall (from their website, via Slate):
To participate, you must have purchased a Baby Einstein DVD between June 5, 2004 and September 4, 2009.
If you are not satisfied with the Baby Einstein DVD you purchased during the period mentioned above, for a limited time beginning on September 4, 2009 and ending on March 4, 2010, you may exchange it for one of the following:
* One (1) Baby Einstein Book of your choice
* One (1) Baby Einstein music CD of your choice
– Or -
* One (1) coupon for 25% off the purchase of one Little Einsteins™ product. Redeemable with promotion code only at DisneyStore.com.
or you may return it, and we will refund the current retail value of the DVD ($15.99).
Campaign for a Commercial Free Childhood, an interest group, describes their version of the recall (via Slate):
As a result of our 2006 Federal Trade Commission complaint, Disney stopped claiming that Baby Einstein videos were educational for infants, but the company made no move to compensate parents who purchased them.
We thought parents deserved better. So, with help from CCFC members like you, we kept the pressure on until Disney agreed to reimburse Baby Einstein customers.
The refund offer is a wonderful victory for families and anyone who cares about children. Recent research shows that screen time is not educational for babies. Now parents who purchased Baby Einstein DVDs, mistakenly believing the videos would make their babies smarter, can recoup their money.
How did the Baby Einstein people officially react? By lashing back, and claiming no guilt:
For the past several years, Baby Einstein has been under attack by propaganda groups taking extreme positions that try to dictate what parents should do, say and buy. Our philosophy has always been to focus on creating products that parents and babies love, and to not get sidetracked and pulled down into their street fight.
Unfortunately, with Susan Linn’s latest stunt, we cannot be silent any longer. Linn’s obvious dislike for Baby Einstein has now turned into a sensational, headline-grabbing publicity campaign that seeks to twist and spin a simple, customer satisfaction action into a false admission of guilt. This is clearly not the case.
Linn’s moves are carefully crafted to prey on parental guilt and uncertainty. This time, she began by asking the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) to go after Baby Einstein because, she said, we claimed that Baby Einstein was educational. But we do not make any such claim – and the FTC brought no action.
We strongly believe that, unlike Linn, our consumers find value in our product, and rather than continue to fight with her, we decided it to leave it up to those consumers. That is why we extended a refund policy that was already in place. Although she would like to claim otherwise, there is nothing extraordinary about a company’s willingness to stand behind its product. To the contrary, it is the strongest possible show of confidence in it.
Finally, what’s Susan Linn’s argument? Stop corporations from limiting kids’ imaginations:
Susan Linn, the nation’s leading advocate for protecting children from corporate marketers…argues that while play is crucial to human development and children are born with an innate capacity for make believe, the convergence of ubiquitous technology and unfettered commercialism actually prevents them from playing. In modern day America, nurturing creative play is not only countercultural—it threatens corporate profits.
In an age when toys come from TV shows, dress-up means wearing Disney costumes, and parents believe Baby Einstein is educational, Dr. Linn lays out the inextricable links between play, creativity, and health, showing us why we need to protect our children from corporations that aim to limit their imaginations.
In sum: If you want to heed the study claiming too much screen time inhibits babies’ language development–and perhaps limit corporate brainwashing in the process–Baby Einstein is offering you an alternative to its DVDs.
Well, for me it’s entirely up to the parents to allow their children to watch tv, decisions on when and what is appropriate to watch for the little ones should be dictated by the common sense not ads and global marketing.We began to buy Baby Einstein in 2002 when our first daughter was about 10 months old and at the time she was watching videos for limited amounts of time.Then our twins two years later were introduced to the dvds and still today at age 7 and 5 my kids enjoy watching Baby Einstein.Of course there are people who use a tv as a free babysitter and their kids are constantly subjected to watching the box , no matter what show it is Barney, Baby E. ,Wiggles or anything else there was created.Smart parents should choose wisely what the kids should watch and the age they should start watching to avoid blaming everybody else for their mistakes.
My kids loved Baby Einstein when they were babies/toddlers. This recall makes me very angry. My kids are now 7 and 4 and are very intelligent children. Whether that has anything to do with BE, I don’t know, but it surely did not hurt them. Baby Einstein was a wonderful experience for us, and we will support Baby Einstein.
Any shmuck who thought plopping your infant in front of a TV set was duped by corporate marketing. Of course its bad for the kid, and of course it was pushed by corporate America. The only surprise is that people are surprised.
I began my daughter on Baby Einstein Videos at 2 & 1/2 months old. She is now 17 months old and knows 18 different signs( Thanks to BE videos that include sign language). She started with drinks at 9 months old and we realized she had learned it from her videos. People are amazed when they see her do signs and ask us where she was taught that? We proudly tell them from her BE videos. This helps her communicate with us and tell us what she wants. Weither it is drinks, bites,water,sleep,etc..It really helps! I will not be returning my videos for a refund, we LOVE them and will continue to watch them. I support Baby Einstein and hope they continue making more educational DVD’s, exspecially with sign language included. Thank You!
This is just more nonsense. It’s the equivalent to people suing McDonalds because it made them fat. I get so sick of people not wanting to own their choices and always looking for someone else to blame. (particularly when that someone has deep pockets) Let’s bring down all of “Corporate America!” then we can all be out of a job! hooray!
I have two kids who have both watched BE and I am so thankful that I had the DVD’s when they were babies. I do not believe that by watching a 20min video their intelligence is greatly affected. My daughter was 9mnths she began to watch the videos. By 15mnths her vocabulary was already between 75-100 words, well above average for her age. The 20min break that I got while she watched the video was MUCH needed! I not only cherished the time I got to have snuggling with her on the couch, I loved seeing her light up watching other babies, giggle at the puppets and learn some simple Sign Language. This whole thing is just ridiculous to me.
My son loves BE. This is ridiculous. People need to stop blaming others for their on mistakes. Grow up and be a better parent thats all. Stop blaming others..
my grand son has speach delay and thank God 4 BE. He was able to communicate through sign thanks to Wordsworth. He is now five and doing quite well. I credit BE for his formative progress. It is one of my staple gifts to new parents.
I am glad to see people using their experiences as great examples to counter this Dr. Linn’s propoganda. The very generous offer of this refund only shows how BE is trying to get passed this quack who probably has a messed up kid and wants to blame corprate America. We have a choice to buy and watch movies. It is to bad this Dr. Doesn’t use her education for something that might actually help children.
This is really sad….considering when the parent bought the DVD they knew it was in front of the television, also the length of the video is posted on the back, You are blaming a company for the time you placed your child in front of the tv knowing it was unhealthy. You are the parent you have control of how much “t.v Watching” you put your child thru, can’t blame them if you would rather have the tv be your babysitter for that amount of time. These are great videos. I will contiue to support BE.
I received the Mozart BE DVD when my son was 3 months old and have since purched others. At first I was hesitant to expose him to TV at such a young age, but then I watched it and my mind was changed. Anyone who has actually watched these DVDs and has kids knows how valuable they are. My now 1 year old son already has a love of classical music and has been signing since he was 10 months. Any parent who uses TV, no matter the program, as a babysitter for extended amounts of time needs to look at other options. I am glad that BE was around as a tool for me to use a few times a week, and it also came in very handy when that needed shower was overdue! I will continue to support BE.
We introduced our son to quite a few Baby Einstein videos when he was 8 months old and up. I never expected them to improve his intelligence but I felt (and still feel) they were a safe occasional distraction. My son is 4 now and he has speech challenges but I am certain that is due to his premature birth, not TV viewing. Even today he enjoys watching Baby MacDonald and gets much needed practice with pronunciation as we repeat the words while watching it together.
Although, I am not a fan of disneyification of storylines, the Baby Einstein series we purchased from Costco have been a great boon to my son’s development. He had and still has sensory issues that I was not aware of until I started trying to do signs with him. The only sign he learnt was ‘more”, yet he did learn to read and associate words with concrete concepts. The videos when used properly can be a great educational asset. He is now 3.5 years old and can read the beginning B.O.B. books. We can not live in today’s word and avoid the t.v. entirely but we can monitor and educate our children as they watch.
My son who is now 4, loved watching the Baby Van Gogh DVD when he was 7 mos and would watch it almost every evening until he was 2 as part of his quiet time before he went off to bed. He is a bright and intelligent little boy and I think thanks to the BE video, appreciates and knows his colours and loves to paint! Whether that has anything to do with BE, I don’t know, but it surely has not harmed him in any way. We will continue to support Baby Einstein and use these videos as a valuable part of his educational experience.
This is total and complete greed on the part of those of you who return these items. Especially if you used them religiously like most people did! My daughter watched these videos interactively with my husband and I and we used them as a teaching tool. She has been tested off the charts in giftedness tests and has not been harmed by watching them as some might want to claim. She knew the planets before she was 2 and also recognized a friends’ painting as a “Monet” at 3 years old because of our interaction with these DVDs. While it cannot, in fact, be claimed that these DVDs will make our kids smarter, or that they had anything to do with her giftedness, I think the fact that they give parents opportunities to interact with their children alongside the DVDs is great. Maybe if you use the DVDs to babysit your children as a substitute for you and your teaching, that could cause the harm spoken of by the research. Certainly the lack of parent interaction has been proven to harm children, has it not? Stop the greed and start paying attention to your kids.
Both of my daughters love Baby Einstein. They watched one of the DVDs for 15-20 minutes 1 or 2 days a week. I think this is what the DVDs were intended for. Moderation. Should we recall candy because parents give too much to their children? Recall beef because people have high cholesterol? You could apply this thought to just about anything. Does Susan Linn support book burning as well?