Move over slime, squishy toys are the latest craze. Just ask mum.
If you are a parent of school-age kids, chances are you may have already heard about the latest obsession squished into backpacks, classrooms, and flying off store shelves: Needoh.
“Every day when I pick them up from school, it’s, ‘Did you go NeeDoh hunting?’” said Stephanie Calzadilla, who is a South Florida mum of two girls. “They think that this is all I do every day, is go Needoh hunting.”
So, here’s the obvious follow-up question. What is “NeeDoh hunting”?
It’s every parent, abuela, tio, teacher, caregiver’s hunt to find a squishy before it’s gone! NeeDoh is a brand of colourful, squishy stress toys that has been around for decades, but like so many trends, what is old is suddenly cool again.
“They’re just relaxing, they’re stress relieving. They’re just fun to play with, like with the different textures, and it’s not just NeeDoh’s,” explained Lauren, a 6th grader who fills us in on the squishy trend – shaped like cheese, butter, strawberries, ice cubes and more!
She said kids collect them, swap them, squeeze them, and try to keep them out of teacher’s sight so they don’t get taken away! Mums try to find them.
“All I can say is, if you can find it, just grab it, that’s all I can say,” said squishy mum hunter, Stephanie.
The demand has been so intense that stores including Target, Five Below, and Learning Express Aventura have seen long lines from shoppers hoping to get their hands on the toys.
Isaac Bendrao is the manager at Learning Express Aventura. He said they’ve had the toys on store shelves for over a decade, but Bendrao says social media is fueling the frenzy.
“We have had lines up to 150 people waiting for us to open the store,” said Bendrao. “The thing now is that a video that can be seen by 10 or 100,000 people, now it’s being seen by millions.”
At Bendrao’s Aventura store, they limit the number of squishy toys per person. The toys typically cost between $3 and $15 in stores, but shoppers are being warned to watch out for online resellers who buy them up and charge far more. That is one reason Bendrao said the store limits customers to one or two NeeDoh toys each, depending on the shipment.
For now, the squishy craze shows no signs of slowing down – and for parents trying to stay in the know, “NeeDoh hunting” may just be part of the routine.
