Big Plush Toys & Lifestyle Trends

Whoever coined the phrase bigger is better knew what they were talking about. When it comes to stuffed animals, it doesn't get any better than big plush. Big plush is so big, it allows for extra snuggling and hugging all things one should do with their soft toys.

Every industry that is part of our daily lives - beauty and health, living and home furnishings, fragrance and food, to name a few are all subject to the latest inspiration of up and coming trends. Trends are about figuring out what the consumer will want tomorrow, what will be most important to them, and how they will live. According to Li Edelkoort, trend prophet of the business world, trend research is not a science, it is an art that rose from necessity. Edlekoort says the forecasting of trends (which is not the same as spotting a trend) is an absolute prerequisite in every branch of industry. That said, the plush toy industry is no different when it comes to figuring out what people want.

The way in which Edlekoort approaches the analysis of deciphering what the next trends will be is by finding the answers to some key questions: what will people's lives be like in the future? What will people want? What needs and wishes will people have? What types of things will a product need to have for it to be a market success? How do you motivate people to buy things? And finally, the most critical question of them all: what is the difference between a trend and a lifestyle? For example, a trend is a shirt, shape or color. A lifestyle can be living in the lap of luxury furnishings, clothing, etc.

Despite the fact that some of these things can have short and medium lifespans in the world of trends, some typically last for a much longer period of time, evolving from one season to the next or even coming back from time to time. For instance, the color pink is now considered a classic and the cosiness of a teddy bear is a time-loved attitude; these are lifestyle trends that have lasted for five, ten and twenty years with some, like plush toys (the teddy bear in particular), lasting more than a century. While some of these trends drop in popularity, the plush toy has not.

While big plush toys may have started out as a trend when they were first designed, they have certainly turned into something else. Big plush toys are one of those lifestyle trends that give us feelings of comfort and calm and more than ever, we need to have that in our everyday, hectic lives.