New California laws 2024: Gender-neutral toy sections required at stores

New CA laws 2024: Gender-neutral toy sections

The bill applies to department stores with 500 or more employees.

LOS ANGELES - Beginning Jan. 1, 2024, certain California retail stores will face fines for failing to offer "gender-neutral" toy sections.

Assembly Bill 1084 invokes a 1959 California civil rights law that prohibits businesses from discriminating against consumers of a protected class - in this case, gender identity.

The law applies to retail stores with more than 500 employees, so big-box stores like Walmart and Target will be subject to the law.

Under the law, retailers can still have aisles labeled for boys or girls, but the stores will be required to create a gender-neutral toy section on the same floor to display "a reasonable selection" of items "regardless of whether they have been traditionally marketed for either girls or for boys."

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The law does not apply to clothes - only to toys and "childcare items," including hygiene and teething products.

Stores that fail to comply will be "liable for a civil penalty not to exceed $250 for a first violation or $500 for a subsequent violation, as provided."

Mother and son shop in the toy section of a Super Target store in Littleton, Colorado Thursday, March 8, 2007. (Photo by Matthew Staver/Bloomberg via Getty Images)

In 2021, California Democratic Congressman Evan Low spoke to the Associated Press about authoring Assembly Bill No. 1084 and said, "We need to stop stigmatizing what's acceptable for certain genders and just let kids be kids.

"My hope is this bill encourages more businesses across California and the U.S. to avoid reinforcing harmful and outdated stereotypes," Low told the Associated Press, adding that he was "incredibly grateful" to receive Gov. Gavin Newsom's signature.

While California is the first state to require that large stores must include a gender-neutral section, some department stores have already changed how they display their products. Target announced in 2015 that it would stop using some gender-based signs in its stores.

See more California laws going into effect in 2024 by tapping or clicking here.

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