Will it Go Round in Circles?

You may file this under “Cranky Old Man… subsection ‘Get Off My Lawn.’”

I would like to go on record as saying that I hate the fidget spinner. Maybe not the product itself, but the craze behind it. If you are not familiar with this item, feel free to scroll on to the next column in this publication. You are one of the few people remaining on this planet unaware of this cultural and commercial phenomenon, and are probably managing to live a healthy, normal, and productive life nonetheless. For those reasons, I am envious of you. I’m sure we can come up with others.

This is the part where I’m supposed to write something directed at the uninitiated. Nope. Not gonna happen. You either know about these things, or you’re blissfully unaware and lucky for that.

“Timing” has never been my strong suit. By the time you read this, there will already have been many pieces about this silly toy. It is entirely possible that, once this is published, the fad will have died. In the meantime, suppliers are air-freighting in these bad boys in record numbers, hoping that the demand will last long enough for them to recoup their expenses. 

I have never been one for fads. On a business level, they’re quite risky. When “neon” colors were the flavor of the month, I refused to order material for umbrellas. Sure… some of my competitors did, and made a quick buck or two. Then got stuck with yards and yards of material. And the same held true with corporate apparel: I’ve lost track of how many fads came and went during my 17 years as a garmento. It would have been foolish for my companies to bow to pressure for something so temporary.

On a personal level, one need look no further than my own personal wardrobe. Essentially, I have lived in Levi’s 501s for longer than I can recall. I assure you that, at no time, did a pair of “Hammer” pants hang in my closet. Or “Zubas.” I’d still be wearing Stan Smith tennis shoes had adidas not messed with the fit of the arch.

Keeping with my tennis background, as a result of my recent relocation, I did throw away my old Jack Kramer wooden tennis racquet. I loved that racquet, and felt in my heart of hearts that, when Prince introduced their oversized racquets in 1976, it would be looked upon with amusement and disgust by tennis purists like myself. This is as good a time as any to mention that, along with that wooden racquet, I also threw away a perfectly good oversized version. Yeah, I may have been wrong about this one.

Sidebar, and I can’t make this up: in the Facebook group for which I’m an admin (Promotional Products Professionals), there was recently a request for “MC Hammer pants.” Oh please… let’s not relive that!

So why do I hate fidget spinners so much? Good question. The short answer? I don’t know.

Full disclosure (when have I not been open and honest with you, Gentle Readers?): I have, in fact, attempted to use one of these things. A former neighbor child let me use hers. I placed it on my finger tip… I attempted to spin it… it fell to the ground and broke apart.

I should emphasize that this is not why she is a former neighbor.

At any rate… I guess my problem stems from the fact that these things are a fad, and I truly believe they’re temporary. As I’d written earlier, suppliers are flying these things in… I just fear that they’re going to get stuck with an awful lot of inventory.

Do you know the alleged history of these things? There’s one popular story claiming that some woman created them back in 1993 in an effort to promote peace in Israel. Yes… rather than throw rocks at police officers, children were encouraged to take out their frustrations by using a fidget spinner. Color me skeptical (we all know I’ve been called worse).

Another, more likely back-story has some fidgety IT guy creating them in 2014, as something to keep him occupied and amused during conference calls. As someone who abhors conference calls, I can see this scenario happening. Me? I tend to play with large bulldog paperclips. I wonder how to turn that into a fad?

Nevertheless… I’m trying to wrap my brain around the popularity and urgency of these toys. Go take a moment and visit the Promotional Products Professionals group on Facebook.  I can promise you that you will not be able to scroll more than two posts in a row before someone has made an inquiry about these bloody things. It’s either going to be an inquiry, or a post about the evils of them. 

Let’s look at that for a moment… the downside to the urgency. In the rush to bring these to the U.S. shores, how many suppliers are bringing these in without proper product safety testing? There are already reports circulating about children swallowing pieces. I don’t mean to be an alarmist (what who me?), but yeah… I’m concerned.

For the record, my former neighbor picked up the broken pieces of the toy I broke and put it back together. To the best of my knowledge, at no point did she attempt to swallow them.

I have it on good authority that these silly things do serve a purpose within the autism and ADHD communities. Official reports seem mixed about their actual benefits, but they allegedly do assist as a calming device for some individuals. Key word: some.

There’s another item on the market which doesn’t seem to have impacted the promotional industry yet, perhaps due to its limited imprint area. “Fidget cubes” are a thing (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fidget_Cube) which, as one online outlet described it, is a baby toy for adults. It has a variety of sensory tools on each side of the cube, such as an on/off switch, a clicker, and a rolling ball. I don’t know… for the same satisfaction, I can just keep clicking a retractable pen which I already have on my desk. 

For one thing, I can continue to annoy anyone within earshot. For another, it has an imprint space for a logo!

Mike Schenker, MAS, is the executive director of the Gold Coast Promotional Products Association (GCPPA), as well as “all that” at Mike Schenker, Consulting. He is a promotional industry veteran and member of the Specialty Advertising Association of Greater New York (SAAGNY) Hall of Fame. He can be reached at mike@mikeschenker.com.