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The original was posted on /r/hobbydrama by /u/Upbeat_Ruin on 2024-07-28 21:50:12+00:00.

Hi! In my last post here, I made passing mention of the Miniverse Make-it-Mini brand and some recent issues with it. Some people in the comments expressed interest in a write-up about the situation, so…here it is. The first version of my writeup got prematurely posted by accident, and Reddit’s lousy post editor kept me from fixing it properly. I really hate Reddit’s post editor.

MGA Entertainment is a large toy corporation that operates out of Los Angeles, California. It was founded in 1979, and the current CEO is Isaac Larian (misspelled as “Larain” in my last post – my bad). Among several other IPs, MGA owns a brand called Miniverse Make-it Mini. Since that’s kind of redundant, I’ll just refer to it as Miniverse.

Miniverse is a line of tiny replicas of various objects, with an emphasis on food products. It’s not to be confused with Mini Brands, a rival IP from Zuru. They come in play kits, but also in surprise blind-capsule form. MGA seems to be allergic to actually telling you what you’re buying. You get a package of itty-bitty components and assemble them into a finished tiny object, making it a craft project on top of a toy. The kits seem like they’d be a lot of fun. As a kid, I loved playsets with lots of teeny accessories, like My Little Pony, Littlest Pet Shop, and LEGO. Had Miniverse been around in my childhood, it probably would have been right up my alley.

So what’s the problem? Oh, nothing much, except that the Miniverse will burn your skin and give you a hacking cough.

Yeah…so these play kits that are marketed to children and placed in the toy aisle, they’re made by pouring liquid UV resin and leaving it to cure. Specifically, they contain the acrylates hydroxyethylmethacrylate (HEMA) and isobornyl acrylate (IOBA), in amounts exceeding federal standards. For those who don’t speak science, this type of resin is a serious irritant in its liquid form and can cause allergic reactions. (It no longer poses these hazards once cured and hardened.) Getting it on your bare skin will irritate it and possibly give you a chemical burn, and it can cause respiratory issues in a poorly ventilated area. Like a child’s bedroom, for example.

And it did cause issue. MGA received 26 incident reports about Miniverse kits, most of them being about skin burns and irritation. One consumer reported that resin fumes from the kits had triggered their asthma. An additional 3 reports can be found on saferproducts.gov’s report page by searching “Miniverse”, alleging skin burns, nose and throat irritation, and the resin sticking to skin with extreme difficulty in removing it. Unlike with the Glamper incident, this time MGA couldn’t get away with making a halfhearted “product safety notice” on their Facebook and telling consumers to go through their clunky customer service process for a return. It was time for a recall, to get that stuff off the shelves ASAP.

The CPSC issued a recall on June 25, 2024 for 21 million units in the United States and an additional 1 million in Canada. Consumers had the option of returning either the complete unopened product, or the unused resin if they had already opened the item. Then, they would receive a refund or a replacement product of equal value, at their choice.

I work in claims at a department store, which means that I process merchandise returns, and pulling recalled items is part of the job. When this all went down, I was there. I’d estimate that we lost a couple hundred dollars’ worth of product to the recall; the pulled product filled an entire L-cart. While my supervisor was packing it up to ship it back to the manufacturer, she complained about what a dumb situation this was. I said something to the effect of, “You’d think this is something they’d have caught in product testing,” and her response was an incredulous “Right?!”

Then again, this is MGA, the same company that gave us the LOL Surprise Glamper, the beast that feasts on little girls’ fingers. Their product safety division doesn’t seem to know wtf they’re doing. This isn’t some little oopsie. HEMA and IOBA are listed on safety data sheets for hazardous chemical handling companies and public health orgs. This is stuff that I would have to double bag and place in a black toxic waste bucket if I was throwing it out at my job. But there it was, packaged in bright inviting capsules for young children to handle, stamped with phrases like “All you can eat!” What the hell.

A week after my store pulled all its Miniverse inventory, I happened to find a capsule that had survived the recall. I took it to claims so it can be sent back to the manufacturer, but not before snapping some pictures for my write-up. I’m glad I found it before it could sneak into an unsuspecting customer’s home. I’m also glad that customers didn’t harass me about it. Apparently, some people have been behaving poorly in light of the recall, to the point where the subreddit for Miniverse has to have a note to not take your anger out on retail employees in its pinned post about the recall.

That type is so tiny. Note how there are no safety warnings for resin. There’s only the standard small parts warning, and a brief line telling you to read the instructions. If you’re unfamiliar with UV resin, it would be easy to buy a Miniverse kit thinking you can just hand it off to your 8-year-old and let them take it from there.

Now, where the Miniverse franchise will go from here remains to be seen. It appears that MGA has changed something about the kits, because some are now available for pre-order as of July 25. Most likely, they have either reformulated the resin or rebranded Miniverse for adult craftspeople. If you ask me, the latter is what should have been done in the first place. Other than that, it seems that MGA has gone radio silent.

For those injured, some law firms are offering their services. It seems that they might be gearing up for a class-action suit. Currently, no litigation has occurred of which I know; we appear to only be in the consultation phase at the moment.

By the way, if you’ve been wondering why the Mini Brands line from Zuru has not been recalled but Miniverse has, that’s because Mini Brands toys are not resin casting kits. They’re just tiny, ready-made models. No resin, no recall.