Holiday hits could include Snuggies, Zhu Zhu pets

(Graphic provided by Panjiva)

Snuggies, a new kind of blanket extolled by cable TV commercials, and the Zhu Zhu Pet, an interactive hamster toy, could be big holiday hits this year, according to Panjiva, a firm that uses technologies developed under the leadership of Panjiva co-founder James Psota, a computer scientist from MIT.

Panjiva, a small firm with offices in New York and Cambridge, uses those technologies to analyze goods being shipped to the United States. Through its "Trends" analysis of bills of lading for ships bringing goods to the United States, Panjiva said it found "that a number of items saw a dramatic increase in the number of shipments to the US during the past three months, indicating store shelves will be well stocked with these potential gifts ahead of next week’s Black Friday, the unofficial start to the holiday shopping season."

Shipments of Snuggies and Zhu Zhu Pets have "skyrocketed" in recent months, Panjiva said. There have also been big increases in the shipments of chocolate truffles and hand sanitizers as well as for products related to the Toy Story movie series.

Of course, if goods are made in the United States or brought into the country by airplane or truck, they would not show up in the Panjiva analysis. However, such goods are thought to make up only a fraction of the holiday merchandise that retailers will stock.

And just because certain products are widely available is no guarantee that consumers will actually buy them in massive quantities.

In any event, merchants are keeping their inventories lean this holiday season after getting stuck with a lot of unwanted merchandise last year, Panjiva chief executive Josh Green said. Still, companies are betting that a handful of products will be big hits, and the Panjiva Trends analysis indicates that those big bets include Snuggies and Zhu Zhu pets.

Meanwhile, some products that were heavily shipped at this time last year are not being shipped in such heavy volume this year.

Those products include Hannah Montana, High School Musical, Batman, and Bratz merchandise, Panjiva said. Shipments of digital picture frames are also down in a year-to-year comparison, Panjiva said.

And here's some bad news for folks who've been more naughty than nice since last year: According to Panjiva, shipments of coal have increased by 6 percent over 2008. (Globe Staff)