Cheap and Collectible, This Year’s Hot Toy Is Squinkies

By STEPHANIE CLIFFORD
NYT

Midway through last year, as analysts tried to predict where the economy was going, the toy maker Bill Nichols decided he had the answer. He bet that the economy would still be so shaky this holiday season that a bargain-priced plastic toy would take off.

With the help of parent bloggers and a tepid economy, Mr. Nichols turned the squishy toys, named Squinkies, into a fad. Walmart.com has been sold out of them for more than a week, and stores nationwide are sold out or limiting how many Squinkies each person can buy. Like Beanie Babies or Zhu Zhu Pets, the toys are collectible — the hundreds of characters include a Lhasa apso dog and a tiny bride — but they are much cheaper, selling for $10 for a 16-pack.

“Demand is tight,” said Laura Phillips, senior vice president for toys and seasonal merchandising at Wal-Mart. “Mom doesn’t feel bad — ‘I can get into it and my child can really enjoy it,’ ” she said. “Absolutely that matters in this economy.”

And children cannot seem to resist scooping up the latest toys, which come in plastic bubbles like a vending machine would dispense, or pronouncing the Squinkies name with glee. (Mr. Nichols described it as made up, but one that was “fun, memorable and came off the tongue easy.”)

(More here.)