With more than 800 styles of Squishmallows, they are quickly becoming rarer to find because of the high demand from young kids to young adults.
While the cuddly companions were created in 2017, they gained a lot of traction on social media over the past summer and have become even more popular among teens.
According to Kelly Dean, the Vice President of marketing at Squishmallows’ parent company, the craze comes while people are craving comfort.
The company started to see sales rise right before the pandemic and attribute some of its success to people’s reliance on the coziness and comfort that the stuffed toys provide.
According to senior Hannah Chasan, she really saw Squishmallows take over around here this past fall.
“I had a bunch last year,” Chasan said, “but I think between them trending on TikTok and seeing them in more stores, we really started to see an uprise of them this past fall.”
Each Squishmallow is a different size and color along with other unique attributes.
According to senior Allyson Mahoney, this is part of what makes Squishmallows “so fun” to collect.
“The cow is definitely my favorite,” Mahoney said. “It has horns and a tail. It’s also blue so I really like the color.”
Chasan currently has 13 Squishmallows.
“My favorite Squishmallow currently is a cactus with a hat, his name is Roberto and my brother has a matching one,” Chasan said.
Attached to each Squishmallow when purchased, is a small card that lists all of the Squishmallow’s unique attributes, as well as its official name.
The best-selling Squishmallows include, “Jenny the Cow,” “BigFoot,” “Baby Yoda” and “Shiba Inu.”
While some enjoy the larger Squishmallows, the smaller, tiny ones, offer their own assets.
“I have a few that are so tiny that they sit on the dashboard of my car, or cling on to my steering wheel,” Mahoney said.
Mahoney still enjoys the larger Squishmallows a lot because she can use them as pillows.
Chasan prefers to display all of her medium to small-sized Squishmallows along the top of her headboard, and chooses to keep them only primarily in her room.
Part of what makes the toys so comfortable is that they aren’t stuffed with the normal material of a stuffed animal.
Squishmallows are instead stuffed with a very soft polyester fiber that has the bouncy and light texture of a marshmallow hence their name.
While Squishmallow’s seem to only be growing in popularity many believe they are just a fad.
According to freshman Jadyn Odenwald, Squishmallows won’t last.
“I think the popularity will fade since trends don’t last too long. there will definitely be some people who still get them and try to find the ‘rare’ ones,” Odenwald said, “ but they can be expensive and people will go broke.”