China Syndrome Leads To A British Business

Nov. 11, 2009 - PRLog -- CHANDLERS FORD. It was a typical Christmas. The children were excitedly tearing into their presents, wrapping paper was strewn over the floor and the aroma of roasting turkey filled the house. But for Antony Brown, a games inventor from Chandlers Ford, Hampshire, things would never be the same again. As he picked his way through the heaps of plastic toys to collect the reams of discarded product packaging he looked at the country of origin. Out of sixteen presents only one – just one – was made in the UK. Everything else was made overseas. In fact, 8 out of every 10 toys and games are now manufactured by one country: China.

“I expect these toys are made under awful conditions,” his wife Carla reflected. “But what can we do? Everything seems to come from China and we can’t give our kids nothing.”

It is probably a common sentiment up and down Britain today but after the festivities they did do something. They did some research and were so disconcerted at what they discovered that Antony and Carla set up their own business to manufacture games in the UK.

There are approximately 8,000 toy factories in China employing tens of millions of poorly educated migrant workers, many earning below legal minimums with forced overtime and often in sweatshop working conditions. “If it is almost impossible to comprehend the scale of the migrant movement, it is even more difficult for a Westerner to imagine the daily life of a migrant toy worker,” says Eric Clark in his book The Real Toy Story. “Exact conditions obviously vary, from the acceptable to the unimaginably awful.”  Despite labour laws and monitoring, the average migrant worker is often working 11-12 hours a day, seven days a week, for as little as 35p an hour.

“The crux of the problem,” writes Clark, “is that the companies who order, the factories who supply, the local authorities who should enforce the law all have a common interest. They want cheap goods delivered on tight schedules so they can all thrive.”

“But I don’t think this is the real problem at all,” explains Antony. “It is us – the consumer – who ultimately drives demand, which the toy companies want to satisfy. As workers in the West we often complain about our own pay, pensions and working conditions, but as consumers we demand cheap goods that require other workers to toil in conditions that we simply would never tolerate. Most of us are aware of this but choose to ignore it, especially at Christmas. I call this the ‘China Syndrome’.”

As a response to the China Syndrome, the couple formed Dice Maestro to produce an innovative range of games with a difference and use business ethics that make a difference. The games are made entirely in the UK, are environmentally friendly and the company even donates a percentage of profits to relevant charities.

Antony adds: “We are not asking consumers to stop buying products made overseas – this would be virtually impossible today – but to be aware that there are alternatives, such as Dice Maestro, in which consumers can buy with a cleaner conscience. Even if there are just one or two products under this year’s Christmas tree that are ethically produced then this will be start. But if we continue to turn a blind eye and continue to have an insatiable appetite for cheap consumer goods regardless of how they are produced then we have no moral right to complain when we lose jobs in our own manufacturing industries, no moral right to moan if our own working conditions and lifestyles are eventually undermined. We’re feasting on a free lunch that may ultimately give our economy and society indigestion. ”

Based on the success of the first game in their, Wildlife Rescue, a game about endangered species, this year Dice Maestro released Jurassic Wars®, a dinosaur combat game which won Game Of The Year in October 2009 (see related Press Releases below for more information). Despite some initial success, Antony and Carla remain extremely cautious: “Without the overseas outsourcing, we have calculated that the toy and game prices in the shops would approximately double. We are trading at a huge price disadvantage so we know we have to a mountain to climb just to survive.”

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CONTACTS

Dice Maestro Limited. Antony M. Brown, director. Tel: 023 8026 1484.
Email: amb@dicemaestro.com   Web: www.dicemaestro.com

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Dice Maestro is an innovative games company specializing in card and dice games that have the quality play of board games and the portability of travel games. Ethically made and manufactured entirely in the UK.