1 Mr. Zhang Shuhong's tragic story provides a glimpse into: a) the pressures that suppliers might be enduring from lead firms, and b) the risk lead firms assume by outsourcing production. Mr. Shuhong was a co-owner of the Lee Der Toy Company, which supplied toys for Fisher Price, a subsidiary of the American toy giant Mattel. On August 2, 2007, Fisher Price recalled almost one and a half million toys supplied by Mr. Shuhong's company, after learning that they were coated with non-approved paint pigment that contained a dangerous level of lead. See: Toys recalled over safety fears, BBC News (2 August 2007), available at: http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/asia-pacific/6927156.stm, last accessed 14 August 2007. On August 13^th, it was reported that Mr. Shuhong hanged himself in his factory. See: Chinese toy boss ‘kills himself’, BBC News (13 August 2007), available at: http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/asia-pacific/6943689.stm, last accessed 14 August 2007. The following day, after a two-week review of the work of Mattel's Chinese subcontractor, Mattel reported that it would have to recall over 18 million toys. See: Mattel recalls millions more toys, BBC News (14 August 2007), available at: http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/business/6946425.stm, last accessed 14 August 2007. As the story progressed, after even more recalls and the firing of several firms, Thomas Debrowski, Mattel's executive vice president for world operations, made a statement to the press stating: “The vast majority of these products that we recalled were the result of a flaw in Mattel's design” and not the fault of Chinese manufacturers. See: Mattel sorry for ‘design flaws’, BBC News (21 September 2007), available at: http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/business/7006599.stm, last accessed 28 September 2007.Google Scholar

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