Parents are snatching up the latest toys for the upcoming holiday season early this year, and it may cause trouble for parents who wait to shop.
Experts are predicting a hot toy shortage this holiday season, but the shortage isn’t due to the phenomenal popularity of the toys themselves, like the Beanie Baby craze that left many trampled, but the fact that toy retailers are scared to order a big stock of even the most popular toys, after last year’s economic crisis left them holding millions of dollars of unpurchased inventory.
The result is that shoppers are already finding it hard to find the toys their kids are begging for, and most shoppers aren’t even prepping for the holiday season just yet.
Experts say the hardest toys to find are probably going to be Zhu Zhu Hamsters, adorable little mechanical hamsters kids are snatching up like the Nano Pets of yester-year,and as MSNBC.com reports, Mattel’s Mindflex, a game that measures brain activity through a helmet, Nerf N Strike, a Nerf dart thrower from Hasbro Inc. and Barbie Fashionista.
So even if you are prepared to spend a little more this year than last, you might be hard up to find what you are looking for. Your best bet? If you see it, buy it. Ask your kids today what their top few choices are for Christmas so you can start keeping an eye out for them. The internet is also a great place to look- check the manufacturer’s site first, and then hit up Ebay.com to try and find a deal.
Or you can be like my parents and ignore what your child asks for, buy your kids what you think they should like, and then get mad when they aren’t overly excited about it. Ah, the holidays.
