Manufactures Continuing Obligations about the Products they Create and Sell

1. You must constantly keep your manual and your website up to date. Any changes in how your product is used or any warnings about the product must be communicated as quickly as possible to all past, present, and future buyers and users of your product.

2. In some states, this duty extends to information you find out about how your product is being used or ways it should not be used after the product has been sold. In the past once the product was sold the duty to warn of the ways to be hurt using a product ended. However, many states are extending this duty to all users and how the product may be used or misused now or in the future.

3. You should maintain a list of your purchasers of your product to notify them of changes to the product, new warnings, etc. This is not a marketing list. This is a list to CYA. You may modify your customer agreements to make this possible and to differentiate between legally required notifications and marketing and the difference in opting out of these emails.

4. If you find out your product is being used in a way that it should not be used, you need to notify anyone using the product incorrectly as a group and owners of the product.

5. Product liable manuals and warnings NEVER stop being created or changed. Always be thinking about how a “stupid human” could create a new way to use your product to get on TV, either as a stunt or a news story.

Information to Remember when Creating Warnings and Warning Labels.

A. Using a larger, bold, or different front always helps have the warnings noticed.

B. Warnings on the Product or in the manual must be easily identified as such by the use of color, size, type of font, or a symbol.

C. Using Bright Colors like Yellow and Orange helps your customers locate the warnings. If your manual is only going to be in black and white, use bold fonts, symbols, and boxes to catch your customer’s eye.

a. The Black Triangle with a yellow or orange fill with an exclamation point in the triangle is a well-known way to identify a warning.

D. At the same time, make sure the warnings are necessary. Too many warnings and the warnings might be overlooked.

E. Make sure the warnings are located where the information that triggers the warning is located in the manual. Listing warnings at the end of the manual is not sufficient.