Last week saw two very instructive kids' product recalls, each important in its own way.

First, the CPSC demonstrated the enhanced powers Congress and President Bush granted it, and the limits of those powers, by going directly to consumers to warn them against Simplicity cribs, which have strangled and killed two infants, ages five and four months, within a year's time. Simplicity was facing bankruptcy after numerous product defects, including the "close sleeper/bedside sleeper," which had a slat width that did not meet regulatory standards, when it put itself on the chopping block last year and got bought out by a soulless conglomerate run by a private equity firm. The new company purchased all assets but claimed no responsibility for defective products manufactured by the old company, which promptly ceased operations, and this clever act of liability laundering left no one holding the bag when regulators at the CPSC learned of the second infant death.

The happy new company refused repeated requests for a negotiated recall, but under its new powers the CPSC was able to issue a warning directly to consumers without the company's consent, urging parents to stop using the crib because of the immediate hazard posed to infants. The commission later reported that most of Simplicity's retailers had agreed to recall the product themselves. Greg at Daddytypes has been all over this story, and honestly? It makes us sick.

The second is one that many of our readers would be puzzled or even incredulous to hear about: A voluntary recall by HABA of nineteen wooden rattles, "clutching toys," and other infant toys. HABA is in many ways setting the bar for wood-and-cloth toys, and has prided itself for years on its natural materials, non-toxic paints, innovative design, and overall stellar safety record. Has the venerable European toy company gone sloppy, lost its edge?

As it turns out, the CPSC approached HABA's American brand with a requested recall of seven products, based on things that sometimes happen to wooden toys when they are repeatedly soaked in water - i.e., when they are washed in the dishwasher. Each of the toys the CPSC had targeted as potentially dangerous had small pieces - mirrors, plastic jewels - that loosened or fell off of the toys after such use.

HABA's wooden infant toys have been labeled with care instructions for a long time. It seemed pretty likely that the reports coming in were not based on design flaws, but user error. The problem seemed confined to the U.S., where consumers are relatively unfamiliar with wooden toys. But the inset bling was a relatively new feature, and a hazard is a hazard, whatever the source. We have seen companies blame consumers for their problems, and it's never pretty. HABA took a different route.

The company took the CPSC's request, looked it over, and countered with a list of eleven additional products the CPSC had overlooked that utilized the same type of design. If the seven the CPSC had targeted posed a problem for American consumers who were accustomed to aggressively cleaning toys with hot water, the other nine should be as well, they reasoned, and proposed their own recall of 17 products, including many popular rattles.

Not all recalls are the same. When a company acts aggressively to confront a potential problem at the earliest possible stage, it can preserve or even build on its reputation. HABA isn't about to stop making wooden infant toys and they aren't about to stop selling them in the U.S. We'd suggest they increase the size or prominence of their care instructions, and they are looking at alternatives to some of the inset items - foil stickers instead of inset mirrors, for example - that will circumvent some of the problems. Overall, this may make HABA look even better than it did before.

But it isn't just spin. Just as individuals reveal themselves most deeply when responding to crisis, corporations' responses to crises are dictated by their culture. I'm not sure many companies have ever responded to recall requests in the way HABA handled this one, and the move speaks volumes about the benefits of buying from companies you know you can trust.