Daily News
From Home Furnishing Business
AHFA Schedules Furniture Safety Meeting for August
July 7,
2015 by in Community / Charitable Support, Industry 
The American Home Furnishings Alliance (AHFA) will hold a furniture safety meeting in August to discuss technical issues related to preventing furniture and television tip-over accidents.
Commissioners and technical staff from the U.S. Consumer Product Safety Commission (CPSC) have been invited to participate as well as the ASTM Subcommittee on Furniture Safety, which is responsible for the tip-over prevention standard for clothing storage units. Additional invited guests include safety executives from the consumer electronics industry and tip restraint manufacturers.
The meeting is tentatively scheduled for Aug. 11 from 9 a.m. to 4 p.m. at Samson Marketing’s office at 2575 Penny Rd. in High Point, and is pending participation confirmation from CPSC officials. Registration will initially be available only to members of the ASTM Subcommittee on Furniture Safety and AHFA member companies due to limited seating. Registration for remaining seats will be open to the industry after July 31.
Registration is available online at https://ahfa.us/events/event/furniture-safety-meeting/. The cost, which includes lunch, is $25 for ASTM subcommittee members and AHFA members, and it is $50 for non-members. Any registrants who are unable to attend should AHFA need to reschedule to accommodate regulatory officials will receive a full refund.
CPSC has made furniture and television tip-over prevention a priority in 2015 by allocating $400,000 to a national public awareness campaign launched June 4. The “Anchor It” campaign is designed to communicate the dangers of tip-over accidents and how easy it is to properly anchor televisions and furniture.
According to CPSC data, television and furniture tip-over accidents have failed to decline in recent years, killing a child every two weeks on average, and sending 38,000 Americans to emergency rooms.
The “Anchor It” campaign includes a new website, www.anchorit.gov, and a video public service announcement spotlighting the propensity of young children to be accident prone. Simple solutions are demonstrated in the video.
HGTV personality Tiffany Brooks is an “Anchor It” campaign spokesperson with CPSC Commissioners Marietta Robinson and Joseph Mohorovic, who are both expected to attend the August furniture safety meeting.