Michael Lerner was 30 years old, running an executive search firm with his father, when a friend mentioned two sisters trying to sell a simple idea. Patricia and Helen Bradley had spotted safety signs in German car windows and thought Americans might want them too. They'd been pitching the concept with no success. Lerner had just driven his 18-month-old nephew home through Boston traffic and remembered the experience vividly. Tailgaters. Aggressive lane changes. The sudden awareness that other drivers had no idea a baby was in his car.
According to Mental Floss, Lerner bought the rights and invested approximately $65,000 of his own money to launch Safety 1st in 1984, producing bright yellow diamond-shaped signs reading "Baby on Board." He changed the original "Baby Aboard" wording and began pitching department stores, arguing the signs belonged in infant sections, not automotive displays. Most buyers dismissed him. Then Bradlees, a now-defunct chain making an aggressive push into child car seats, agreed to stock the product. Sears and Toys "R" Us followed.
Lerner sold 10,000 signs in September 1984. By the end of 1985, he was moving 500,000 per month. Fox News reported that within barely a year of launch, more than 3 million cars displayed the sign. The yellow diamond became as common as a spare tire, stuck to rear windows across America with suction cups.
The problem arrived almost immediately. Once "Baby on Board" caught on, anyone with access to a print shop could make their own version. Parodies flooded the market. "Baby Driving." "Grandma on Board." "Ex-Husband in Trunk." "Illiterate on Bord." According to Mental Floss, knockoffs reportedly outnumbered the original signs several to one in some areas. Lerner was capturing only a fraction of the total revenue generated by the car sign industry his product created.
So he pivoted. Instead of fighting copycats over a single yellow sign, Lerner used it as a launchpad for a broader child safety products company. Safety 1st expanded into drawer locks, soft faucet covers, poison alert labels, door signs warning that babies were sleeping inside, and eventually larger items like diaper pails and baby monitors. The product line grew from 20 items to over 300 by 1994.
Retailers responded. Toys "R" Us named Safety 1st its "Vendor of the Year" in 1990. Walmart followed in 1991 with "Vendor of the Quarter." According to Encyclopedia.com, sales jumped from $7.7 million in 1989 to $43 million in 1993. The company went public with a stock offering in April 1993, selling two million shares successfully. By 1994, net sales hit $70 million. In 1999, Safety 1st reached $158 million in annual sales.
Lerner sold the company to Canadian firm Dorel Industries in 2000. Multiple sources including Fox News and Carsales confirm Lerner personally walked away with $38 million from the deal. Some reports put the total transaction value at $195 million, though that likely included debt assumption and ongoing earn-outs.
The irony wasn't lost on anyone. The man who built a multimillion-dollar child safety empire never had children. When asked about it years later, Lerner told Fox News he'd never actually used one of his own signs and added, "I haven't given up" on the possibility of becoming a father. By 2016, when he listed a newly completed Miami Beach mansion for $29.5 million, he was relocating to Palm Beach with no mention of family.
The sign itself became a cultural artifact. By the late 1980s, parody fatigue set in. Parents tired of the jokes. New drivers tired of being told what to do by a yellow diamond. Safety concerns emerged. Some argued the signs distracted drivers rather than cautioning them, and that blocking rear window visibility created hazards. Emergency responders debunked the urban legend that the signs helped locate babies in crashed vehicles, a myth that persists despite Safety 1st never claiming that purpose.
In 2014, Dorel estimated more than 10 million signs had been sold. The number doesn't account for all the knockoffs, parodies, and unlicensed copies that saturated the market during the peak years. One of those purchases led to an April 1987 arrest reported by Mental Floss: Florida police pulled over a driver on Interstate 95 after spotting a "Baby on Board" sign, grew suspicious of the driver's nervousness, searched the vehicle, and discovered 15 pounds of cocaine hidden in compartments. The driver, Freddy Franco, was violating a state law banning items from rear windows and also happened to be trafficking narcotics.
The success story follows a familiar pattern. Simple idea from Europe. American entrepreneur recognizes potential. Initial resistance from retailers. Sudden explosion of demand. Market saturation. Copycats. Product becomes a cultural joke. Smart entrepreneur pivots to broader business model before the fad collapses. Company grows. Sale to larger corporation. Founder retires wealthy.
What made Lerner's execution notable was the speed. He bought the rights in 1984, hit peak sales by 1986, pivoted into broader product categories by the late 1980s, built a legitimate child safety products company doing nine figures in annual revenue by 1999, and exited with $38 million in 2000. Sixteen years from initial investment to eight-figure payday.
The yellow diamond still exists. You can buy original Safety 1st "Baby on Board" signs today, though they carry none of the cultural weight they held in 1986. New parents still stick them to rear windows, either unaware of the sign's history or indifferent to the parody era that made the product a punchline. Emergency responders still ignore them. Other drivers still tailgate regardless.
Michael Lerner spent $65,000 and built an empire from a stressed drive with his nephew. The sign got copied to death. The company he built around it made him a multimillionaire. And he never changed a single diaper.