Britax expiration date?

[doodlesmama]

I recently purchased a MA from BRU this weekend and although I've always been under the impression that car seats expire 6 years from the DOM, I was told by the "car seat lady" there that Britax actually expire in 10 years due to their special plastic or something like that? I bought the seat for my SIL, my DD already rides RF in an ashley MA from albeebaby.

Is this true? I don't know if I would feel comfortable using a car seat for that long, but I'm sure if this lady is telling everyone that buys a Britax from them that the exp. is 10 years they'll probably use it 10 years.

[vonfirmath]

Who was this car seat lady? The manuals for Britax carseats say 6 years (Except for the Frontier, which says 9 years for the booster part, I believe)

If it was a rep from Britax, you might want to let Britax know what their representative is saying.

[codex57]

I bet it's the BRUS employee who happened to be wandering the car seat aisles.

There's only two BRUS employees I'd trust for car seats. Seeing as how I can't remember the name of one of them, it's really more like just one. Jools. And she doesn't really count cuz she got a job there to help combat the misinformation from within. She's like an undercover agent for the good guys.

[pastrygirl]

Yikes. There's even a crash test video available online of a 10-year-old Britax, where the harness rips right out of the shell!

[doodlesmama]

Yeah, it was just BRU's car seat lady. I don't know if I should call and tell them that they're misinforming their customers. I really hope it's not some way of getting people to buy the more expensive Britax car seats vs. others because they supposedly get 4 more years out of them. :shake:

[Joolsplus2]

The extent of my fellow employee's ignorance never fails to surprise me... sigh.
Their own internal educational materials say 5 years for infant seats (that would be ONLY the peg perego, so why did they generalize? to sell more seats, I'm sure, lol), and 7 years for convertibles (um... that'd be none? Coscos are 8 or 6, Evenflos are 6, Gracos are 6, Britax is 6... so 7 is an 'average' or something?) 10 on the Britax, yeah, that's just special beyond words... :loveeyes:
I'm not sure it would help to call... They won't do any extra education (there's no time...they cut hours to the bone and most stores just scramble to have the bare minimum of staff).