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Panjiva Trends Technology Reveals Hot, Not-Hot Holiday Gifts

Snuggies, Zhu Zhu Pets and Toy Story Items in Demand; Bratz, Hannah Montana and High School Musical on Decline

Panjiva, the leading source of objective information on global manufacturers, today revealed which holiday items are expected to be big sellers and which will flop. The data has been generated from the company's new Panjiva Trends technology, also available beginning today. Through its Trends analysis, the company 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 next week's Black Friday, the unofficial start to the holiday shopping season.

"Despite only a modest uptick in October global trade shipments and conservative predictions from retailers for holiday sales, our data shows that business executives are placing big bets on a handful of items, which consumers will find readily available on store shelves this holiday season," said Panjiva CEO Josh Green.

What's Hot and What's Not This Holiday

Panjiva Trends shows that Snuggies are expected to be in high demand this year, as well as Zhu Zhu Pets, a hamster toy that has already appeared on several lists of this year's hottest toys. Shipments of both items to the US have skyrocketed for the three months ending in October. Chocolate truffles and hand sanitizer may be the most popular stocking stuffers this season, experiencing 468% and 222% increases in shipments, respectively, over the same three month period last year. Other popular items, based on the items' increase in number of shipments to the US, include Toy Story items (827%), hand magnifier (287%) and booklights (193%).

Unfortunately, for naughty children who are worried they may receive coal in their stockings this year, shipments of coal did, in fact, increase 6% over last year.

Hannah Montana and High School Musical merchandise, hot items in 2008, are no longer in high demand; both saw a rapid decrease (90% and 95%, respectively). Other items and merchandise that may have moved to the bottom of wish lists and will not be as readily available this season include Batman (down 74%), digital picture frames (77%) and Bratz (90%).

Panjiva Trends Monitors Developments in Global Trade

As a way to track changing consumer demands, economic developments and shifts in the market, Panjiva has launched Panjiva Trends. This new technology allows users to see which countries and suppliers items are being shipped from, monitor increases or decreases in the number of shipments, and identify which items are experiencing an uptick or drop off in demand. For the next 30 days, Panjiva Trends is available for free trial by visiting http://panjiva.com/trends.

Panjiva Trends is a part of the company's Executive Dashboard offering, a product that will be made fully available in early 2010.

About Panjiva's Methodology

Panjiva's patent-pending technologies were developed under the leadership of Panjiva co-founder and CTO James Psota, a computer scientist from MIT. The technologies enable Panjiva to process huge amounts of data, cleanly and quickly.

The Panjiva intelligence platform combines data from a variety of sources, so that Panjiva's clients can easily find new suppliers and keep tabs on their existing suppliers.

Panjiva Trends relies on Panjiva's machine learning and natural language processing technologies which extract relevant information from millions of waterborne shipping records, providing a clear, real-time picture of what products U.S. companies are importing, and from where.

About Panjiva

Panjiva is an online resource for sourcing executives to gain credible and valuable knowledge about suppliers and manufacturers around the world. By providing the most comprehensive data in an easy to use format, Panjiva informs the decisions that facilitate doing business globally. Supply chain and global production executives responsible for finding the right factories, negotiating costs and avoiding costly supply chain disruptions have been "flying blind." Panjiva is the first and only online information source designed to provide complete transparency into overseas suppliers. Leveraging a variety of public and proprietary data sources, Panjiva is bringing new levels of visibility to the management of global supply chains. Panjiva was founded by CEO Josh Green and CTO James Psota. Panjiva received an equity investment from Battery Ventures and a contingent of angel investors. For additional information, visit: http://panjiva.com