Our Approach
We take a multi-faceted approach to product safety and quality that aims to ensure that
everything we sell meets our quality performance and safety expectations. Our efforts integrate
the expertise of merchants, buyers, product developers and designers; mechanical, electrical
and industrial engineers; and quality control and compliance analysts.
1
Providing customers with quality products that meet their needs
Product quality has been an area of focus for our Company for many years, and we are proud of
our continual progress and success. We make use of many tools, processes and strategies, including construction specifications, new products assessment protocols, root cause analysis measures for defective products and validation processes for corrective action plans.
Delivering quality products to customers
The greatest indicator of how well our product teams have done their jobs is in our
defective claim rates and product return rates. We are proud to say that our focus and
attention in this area has resulted in some of the lowest defective claim and product
return rates in the industry. At Canadian Tire stores, our 2022 defective claim rate1 was
0.9%, and we have consistently achieved defective claim rates below 1% over the last
five years. Our customer product return rate2 at Canadian Tire stores in 2022 was 3.1%.
Defective Claim Rate
0.9%
Product Return Rate
3.1%
In addition to our return and defective rate metrics, our teams also leverage feedback from our
online reviews, stores, After Sales Service Program and supply chain partners to improve upon
existing products. In 2022, approximately 1,200 customer complaints were reviewed by our
Product Quality team, 10% fewer complaints than in the prior year.3
Our process of investigating complaints and analyzing issues with products often includes
working with product developers and vendors directly to share our data and solutions. For
example, in 2022, we reduced our defective claims of Christmas lights by 17% compared to
2021 by analyzing consumer returns, sharing our engineers’ analysis with our vendors and
developing product designs and manufacturing techniques that resolved the product failures.
This allowed all parties to avoid financial impact, improved manufacturing efficiencies and, most
importantly, improved our customers’ experience with the products.
TESTED for Life in Canada
Our Canadian Tire TESTED for Life in Canada program tests thousands of products
using qualified testers who understand and share the same needs as our customers.
These testers use and examine our products in real-life settings, examining every
feature and function to ensure that these products are suited for life in Canada. Honest
feedback is then collected to help fellow Canadians make informed decisions on
products for their everyday lives. Only products that have an average rating of 4+ stars
earn our TESTED badge. Learn more about our TESTED for Life in Canada program.
2
Ensuring that our owned brand products are safe for our customers
CTC offers over 100 owned brands, including familiar names such as Mastercraft, MotoMaster
and Woods. In 2022, we spent over 3,300 person-days in our manufacturing partners’ factories
assessing facility capabilities and monitoring production within our supply chain. Some of these
facilities that produce our owned brand products are also ISO 9001 certified, a quality management standard with principles on strong customer focus and continual improvement.
These facilities are also subject to a rigorous auditing process, and we rely on various auditing
protocols including amfori Business Social Compliance Initiative audits. Learn more in our
Human Rights & Social Responsibility section.
For our owned brand products, we perform in-house and third-party testing and product
evaluations during the development and prototype stages. This testing includes chemical,
material, safety, performance, functionality and durability evaluations among other aspects of
the product. We rely on a risk framework to assess all our product categories, and work with
each vendor and brand to implement a testing and inspection plan targeting the highest risk and
most impactful products. Through this process, all our high-risk owned brand products are
subject to third-party testing. We also perform random testing during the product life cycle to
ensure manufacturing and design consistency.
To support our commitment to product safety and quality, we actively participate in several
product safety associations and committees, including the International Consumer Product
Health and Safety Organization; Retail Council of Canada’s Product Safety and Recall
Committee; Retail Industry Leaders Association’s Product Safety Committee; and American
Apparel & Footwear Association’s Product Safety Council. We are also active with various
standards development organizations that focus on product safety and sustainability standards,
including the Canadian Standards Association, UL and the International Organization for
Standardization (ISO). In addition, the Company benefits from our activities on Standards
Council of Canada committees that are focused on consumer interests and sustainability, which
influence the federal government’s Chemicals Management Plan under the Canadian
Environmental Protection Act. By working with these associations and committees, we stay
comprehensively up to date on best practices regarding the use of safe materials across our
business.
Keeping harmful chemicals out of our products
Our customers share our concerns about the safety and durability of our products. That
is why we work diligently to ensure that our products remain safe and do not pose a risk
to health or the environment when used and disposed of as directed. For more than a
decade, we have been going beyond government requirements by choosing safer
alternatives for substances and chemicals in our products where there is scientific
evidence of health or environmental risks.
We maintain a Safer Chemicals Policy and continue to make updates based on our comprehensive data gathering and collaboration with industry safety associations and committees. Some recent actions include:
- Eliminating formaldehyde in all manufactured wood products
- Piloting the industry standard bluesign® Restricted Substances List, with plans to
engage all our vendors of apparel and footwear products across the enterprise
on these standards by the end of 2023, with stricter enforcement to follow in
future years
- Continuing a multi-year effort to identify, reduce and eliminate the use of the
PFAS/PFOS family of chemicals in all our products
- Continuing efforts to expand chemical restrictions and alternative chemical
assessments on all food handling products
When the unfortunate situation of a product recall with one of our vendors or products occurs,
we immediately work to relay the message to customers who may have purchased that product.
In addition to amplifying the manufacturer’s message, we use our available Triangle Rewards
membership data to reach customers directly so that we might prevent them from experiencing
any potential harm. Out of our thousands of owned brand products sold through CTC in 2022,
six were involved in a consumer recall, a small decrease from seven in 2021.4