When it comes to the flawlessness of a product, most companies tout lofty ideals. In a perfect world, the consumer could rely upon this purported safety and dependability. But in reality, companies do make mistakes when designing the products they sell and they are held liable for the products they create. There are companies that knowingly or negligently fail to invest the time, effort, and funding toward ensuring that every element of their product production process is flawlessly executed.

When a consumer purchases a product, they do so under an assumption that the product is safe. There are a number of consumer protection laws, consumer protection agencies, and private consumer protection advocacies that work to ensure consumers are protected from faulty products and negligent companies are held responsible for their product. However, there are still countless injuries and deaths from faulty products each year.

Product defects can occur from the moment the item is designed all the way until it is picked up by the consumer off the distributors' shelf.

Three Main Types of Product Defects

1. A design defect is a fundamental flaw during the early development of the product which results in the product being unreasonably dangerous to the consumer, despite being used in the manner in which the product was designed to be used. An example would be a poorly designed frying pan handle that separates from the frying pan, thereby causing the consumer to be burned.
2. Even carefully designed products are still subject to manufacturing defects. This occurs as the result of some failure during the manufacturing stage a weak area in the product, a product missing a crucial operational part, tainting, etc. It can also be the result of using substandard materials or chemicals. A specific example of a manufacturing defect might be an automobile seatbelt that fails during an accident due to being poorly attached.
3. A product can be safely designed and manufactured, but still be unsafe if the manufacturer and/or distributor fails to take appropriate steps to avoid placing the consumer at unreasonable risk for injury. In other words, manufacturers must alert and warn consumers of any danger(s) that aren't obvious and provide safe use instructions. Any product that has unclear, difficult to see or inadequate safety warnings can be liable for an injury that the consumer suffers from during product usage. Appropriate ages of use should also be clearly specified.

Those that have suffered an injury from a product defect should contact an experienced product defect lawyer to protect their legal rights and possibly file for compensation.