2.2 million beanbag chairs recalled
The chairs are being recalled because the zippers on the bean bag chairs can be opened by children who can then crawl inside, get trapped and suffocate or choke on the bean bag chair's foam beads.
NEW ORLEANS >> A New Orleans company is voluntarily recalling about 2.2 million beanbag chairs after the chairs were implicated in the suffocation deaths of two children.
The New Orleans Advocate reports Ace Bayou Corp. announced the recall Friday along with the U.S. Consumer Product Safety Commission.
The beanbag chairs were sold in a variety of sizes, shapes, colors and fabrics and are filled with polystyrene foam beads. Two children, a 13-year-old boy from McKinney, Texas, and a 3-year-old girl from Lexington, Kentucky, died in separate incidents after they crawled inside the chairs and then suffocated.
The recalled chairs have two zippers that can be unzipped and opened, including one on the exterior cover and another one directly underneath that zipper. The company is offering free "safety enhancement kits" to anyone who purchased the chairs. The kits disable the zippers so that the chairs can no longer be unzipped from the outside.
The beanbag chairs were sold at Bon-Ton, Meijer, Pamida, School Specialty, Wayfair and Wal-Mart stores and online at Amazon.com, Meijer.com and Walmart.com before July 2013 for between $30 and $100.
They were made in China. "ACE BAYOU CORP" is printed on a tag sewn into the chair’s cover seam.
Don't miss out on what's happening!
Stay in touch with top news, as it happens, conveniently in your email inbox. It's FREE!
The CPSC urged consumers to contact Ace Bayou via the website, www.acebayou.com, for a free repair kit to permanently disable any zippers so that the chairs can no longer be unzipped from the outside.
