1/14/14 UPDATE
I found a YouTube video of an infant falling from an infant seat and a Home Depot employee catching the baby. Watch the video, share this post around. Please stop this unsafe practice!
I see this all the time at Target, Wal-Mart and anywhere else with a shopping cart – the little baby infant car seat clipped to the front of the cart. Until tonight I thought it was safe and the normal thing to do.
Well now I know better.
According to the American Academy of Pediatrics (AAP) parents or caregivers should “not place an infant carrier on top of the shopping cart” (Shopping Cart Safety Article, Feb 2010).
The reasons are quite simple and make perfect now that I have read them through.
Not all shopping carts are made to safely hold all types of infant carriers. I can remember one experience with my Graco infant seat at Target when no matter what I did I could not get the seat to stay put in the front of the cart. Sure, I got it to make the “click” noise but then Lizzie was still somewhat loose and any wiggling scared me. There was another store where I could not get the seat to click at all in the front. So the safest option that works with all stores and seats – putting the infant carrier in the main part of the cart.
But then I have no room for the food.
And this is where my personal preference for baby carriers comes in play. After baby girl gets here in December I will still go to the store with all three and I know I will be wearing her in a carrier of some sort until she can sit, strong and unsupported, in the front seat of the cart or the little car attached to the front. This is what I did for David and it worked out so well. Not only was he happier being “held” by me but I had a lot more room in my cart and he was a million times safer in my carrier than in the germy cart.
I know that baby carriers are not for everyone though and that is fine. I just hope that the AAP article will help some people when they are deciding how to grocery shop with an infant. They have some wonderful tips for what you can do to make the shopping trips safer – and they include safety tips for older children as well.
The first time I ever took my first-born to Target with me, I grabbed a cart, attached her car seat, saw that it didn’t actually “attach” and put her into the ERGO instead. I see moms doing this all the time and I’m shocked because you can just see how unstable it is!
I have a beco butterfly, but have tried the Ergo – it is a wonderful carrier 🙂
It is just the normal thing to do – you go shopping, you put the baby on top of the cart. I actually thought they were made to do that but when I read the AAP article I was shocked that they were not made to do that.
I have stopped doing this as well. I will put him inside the cart or carry him. It’s just too scary!
Target is the ONLY place that won’t ‘click and latch’. Pretty much every other place does have the appropriate size and shape to click and actually latch. So if you go to Wal-Mart, don’t worry about it. The PROBLEM, REALLY is that people put the seats sideways in the ‘child area’ on top, instead of clicking them down. That’s how all the injuries occur. So instead of facing you, they’re in there facing the side aisles. Easy to knock them off if they’re not secured. Once that thing actually clicks, you CAN’T get it off by bumping it, you actually have to release the safety. Trust me, I’ve yanked my arms practically out of socket with a 10 lb car seat and 20 lb baby enough to figure this out. I wholeheartedly agree that you should just get another carrier, but unfortunately, the safety problem IS with the parent, not how the carseat or the shopping cart works in most cases. Except Target, which apparently, has sucky carts! 🙂 Unless you are SUPER careless, if your baby is clicked, you’re okay.
LOL Jill Target does have pretty sucky carts.
I haven’t seen it as much where people put the seat on the cart sideways but I’ve seen it a few times. And yes, that is definitely more dangerous. Thank you for bringing up that important point.
Even if your baby is “clicked” in it is still unsafe! If someone were to knock into your cart your baby would go down with it. Most people don’t put their baby tight enough in the car seat so they could fall out of the car seat. It’s just not worth the risk. My car seat does not have the option to put it on the top so Ethan always was inside the basket. I just piled up food around him! I will carry the new baby when he/she arrives.
Back when Lizzie was a baby I would even unclick her carseat seat belt thinking I was making it more comfortable for her. What little I knew about her safety and I never even thought of the possibility of my cart getting knocked over. But it does happen since according to the article each year around 23,000 children get treated in hospitals for shopping car related accidents.
I’m a horrible mom because I knew from the beginning it wasn’t “correct” and still I did it. Oh well. And I never had an issue with Target carts, but all of our stores have the new ones.
No Katie, a horrible mom leaves her baby out in the car while she shops! You are a very good mom.
I was just hoping to share what I learned last night. I actually never knew it was unsafe to put the seats there and wanted to share this info with other people.
Just wait until I put up my anti-stroller article! *totally kidding*
With my 3rd baby, we got a chicco infant seat and the way that the bottom is made- it can’t go in the top part of the cart. In the manual, it said they did that intentionally b/c it’s not safe.
I was a fan of the baby carrier.
I am a huge fan of baby carriers too 🙂
Another bonus of baby carriers – people are a million times less likely to touch your baby if they are being worn on you. That makes those “please don’t touch the baby” signs unnecessary. Love it!
Good to know! Mine is too big for this anyway now, but I was guilty of putting him on top of the shopping cart in the carseat when he was smaller, especially if he was asleep when we arrived at the store or if my back was hurting too much to carry him in a baby carrier. I often felt uneasy about it though.
I have a Chicco and was never able to do that anyway! The car seat is so much larger I had to put him down into the basket, which you are right, left no room for food! I hope the next baby likes the carrier because it would be so much easier.
People used to stop and try and explain to me how to attach the carrier to the seat section of the cart. I didn’t know any of this at the time, I was just a paranoid mom who had waited far too many years to finally succeed at having a child to take any chances with her. Putting her in the main area of the cart didn’t leave a lot of room for groceries or whatever I was shopping for, but I fuigured it was better to make extra trips, than risk her falling. I did attach it to the top when she got a little older, and even then only on the heavier carts.
I never ever do that with the babies car seat! I freak out when I see other ppl do it, my hubby swore to me it was ok but i wouldnt have it! I gotta show him this to prove i was RIGHT lol
I bought a combi shuttle infant seat/ travel system for my boy because I needed it to be lightweight enough for my husband to use even with his lifting restrictions, and as an added bonus it didn’t have the clicker for carts. Husband was disappointed, but boy was safe!
Yay for baby carriers! Landon has been shopping with us in a ring sling since he was 3 days old. He slept through it all in the beginning. Now he’s trying to grab my coupons and eat them. He perfers being carried to the shopping cart now. I don’t mind it, just onto a new carrier soon since he’s getting to heavy for my shoulder and back to love him in the ring sling haha.
If you ever need help with carriers just ask me! I know a lot. 🙂 We used wraps with Hunter until he was over 2.