Fidget Spinners Survey: Few Expect Trend to Continue Much Longer

If you’ve been around any young people in recent months, you’re probably familiar with fidget spinners. The spinning, propeller-like toy has exploded onto the scene recently. According to a report from Asbury Park Press, fidget spinners have led to increased sales for plenty of toy companies. But those companies are also worried about how long this trendy product might remain popular. So what do consumers think of fidget spinners? And what might the future look like for retailers that carry these items?

Fidget Spinners

In Ask Your Target Market’s latest online survey, 82% of respondents said that they know what fidget spinners are. 19% said that they’ve purchased multiple fidget spinners. 17% said they’ve purchased one. And 65% of respondents said they’ve never purchased a fidget spinner. In general, 61% of respondents said they think fidget spinners can be beneficial for people with attention span issues. 74% think that fidget spinners can help people relieve stress. And 77% think that they can also be distracting.

Future Buyers

Looking forward, 31% of respondents said they are at least somewhat likely to purchase fidget spinners at some point in the future. Of those who are likely to purchase, 63% already own at least one fidget spinner. According to Personality Radar, those who are likely to purchase fidget spinners are trendy and tech savvy consumers who also appreciate a good deal. Additionally, just 24% of respondents said they think fidget spinners are likely to be as popular as they are now by the end of the year. 62% think they probably won’t be as popular by the end of the year. And 13% were neutral or had no opinion.

Toy Consumers

Overall, 18% of respondents said they’ve purchased toys within the past week. 22% have made toy purchases in the past month. 15% have done so in the past three months. 17% have within the past year. 13% last made toy purchases more than a year ago. And 15% said they aren’t toy consumers at all. Of those who purchase toys at least on occasion, 29% said that the most important factor that goes into their buying decisions is specific requests from kids or gift recipients. 26% said they care most about price. 21% look for quality above all. Just 10% consider a toy’s popularity to be most important. 9% look for educational value. 4% care about style and aesthetics. And 2% care most about brand name.

Key Takeaways

It’s clear that fidget spinners are popular. And that popularity doesn’t seem to be in any immediate danger of going away. But few consumers expect the product to retain this level of popularity over the long haul. So retailers that sell them could take a few different paths. One option is to simply prepare for the end of the craze by not dedicating a ton of resources to buying or manufacturing fidget spinners well into the future. Or those companies could try to prolong the trend by targeting those who already own fidget spinners and finding ways to make new purchases more appealing to those consumers. They could do this by offering coupons in packaging that can be used on future purchases, creating products that work together with unique new features, or even trying out a subscription type of selling model. You can view the complete survey results in the widget below and be sure to click “Open Full Report” to take advantage of all the chart and filter options. Photo Credit: 3 Fidget Spinners by JoanDragonfly under CC BY-SA 2.0 What do you want to know? If you need some consumer insights on a particular topic, let us know in the comments below and we’ll consider it for an upcoming survey post.

Results were collected on July 3 via AYTM’s online survey panel.