- October 20, 2026
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Toy entrepreneur Faith Bench, who has become something of a global social media sensation from her humble beginnings as an east Manatee County middle school teacher, has one of those so-called good problems with her business.
A store off U.S. 301 near two industrial bakeries and a collision repair shop, Fidget Toys Plus is filled with sensory toys that squish, pop, crackle and in some cases, change color. The shop is open Friday to Sunday, and by the end of the three days, the shelves are empty. Bench's staff of five spends the rest of the week restocking the store and fulfilling online orders for the in-demand items.
Bench says the current explosion of business is the result of a “tornado” of factors driving her popularity — including social media fame and the rise of a toy-bartering practice she pioneered called “fidget trading.”
Her success is especially fueled by social media: Known as “Mrs. Bench” on social channels, she has 6.7 million TikTok followers worldwide and nearly 2.9 million YouTube subscribers, with videos featuring fidget trading and sensory toy products she sells. She also has 435,000 Instagram followers and 389,000 Facebook fans. About 99% of her customers have discovered Bench and her store through social media, she says.
“Friday there's a rush of people. Saturday there's a line of people, and by the end of the day Sunday, it is completely sold out,” says Bench, 36.
Products in Fidget Toys Plus typically range from about $2 to $8 but can be higher for jumbo or specialty items. Some of the most popular toys are known as “squishies” that change shape when squeezed, including popular brands like NeeDoh of New York and Ja-Ru of Jacksonville. This month, Bench is rolling out her own product, a mat that facilitates the trading of squishies and other toys.
About 75% of the business is online, while 25% is in person, according to Bench.
In 2025, the revenue for Fidget Toys Plus was over seven figures, she says, even though sales were down since founding the store in 2020. Revenue varies each year, she adds, based on “peaks” driven by trends.
“In the three months we were open in 2020, we did more [sales] than we did in 2025,” Bench says. “And then 2026 is going to be a big year. We're very profitable. … It’s all relative.”
Bench’s entrepreneurial journey began while she was a teacher. She spent eight years teaching math at Braden River Middle School then worked at the district level as a curriculum specialist for secondary math. The district named Bench Educator of the Year in 2020.
In March 2020, during the first weeks of the pandemic lockdown, Bench began posting videos to engage students and teachers about items she had in her classroom. In one video, which she says went on to get 20 million views, she showed sensory toys.
“People were like, ‘I need those. What are those? Can you talk more about those?’” Bench says. “They wanted to know where they could get them, and at the time, you couldn't get them anywhere. And so I curated this little store, and I named it FidgetToysPlus.com, and I launched it in October of 2020, and it was the first ever fidget toy store.”
Within the store’s first 24 hours, Bench says she received 1,000 orders. She was still working for Manatee County schools at the time until retiring from that job in 2021.
Bench says she has never needed to take out a loan for the business.
“I purchased the products originally for my launch, and then sold everything immediately, and so that was like a big cash infusion,” Bench says. “Then I kept selling the products while I procured more, and I've always just been able to do that.”
Thinking she could make the toys even more purposeful, Bench in 2021 started doing what she calls “fidget trading,” when she would meet in-person with another person to barter over the toys. It was a way to give items that may be sitting around new life and also to teach lessons about value.
For fidget trading, Bench created a system with a plus to indicate more value was needed — like an additional toy — to make the trade fair, a minus to reject the deal or a check to accept the proposed exchange. She says the experience has provided an alternative activity to screens that enables parents to spend time with their children and for kids to learn communication and self-advocacy skills.
In 2026, Bench says, fidget trading has gone viral, with celebrities from the New York Jets to Ariana Grande getting in on the action on social media. (The Jets tagged Mrs. Bench in their video.)
“It's unlocked a new demographic of people who are buying squishies for themselves, not for their kids or their niece,” says Bench, whose typical customers are between the ages of 6 and 13 years old.
With fidget trading, Bench says, she’s seen those in their 20s, 30s and 40s participating regardless of whether they have children. People capture their trades on viral videos.
Viral and hot: year-over-year industry-wide squishy sales through August had jumped 723%, according to market research firm Circana, from $24 million to $280 million.
Bench has been riding the wave of fidget toy fame in recent months. In June she was getting more than a million views on her TikTok videos of fidget trading each day. In July, she was featured in The New York Times for her role as the activity’s founder. Fidget trading became so popular with her in the store that Bench had to change the trading hours to by appointment only. People will fly in from other states to fidget trade with her, she says. While it does not generate revenue directly, she says the activity drives people to her website from social channels.
On Oct. 20, Bench launched her own branded fidget trading mat in pink or blue that displays the plus, minus and check on either side. The package also comes with a mystery squishy. Next, she is releasing a fidget toy advent calendar for the holidays.
The surge in squishies’ popularity is twofold, according to The Toy Association, a trade organization for the toy industry; it is driven on one hand by the sensory experience and on the other hand by social media.
“For adults and kids alike, sensory play through squishies can help slow the day down and offer a break from screens by giving the hands something to do that doesn’t involve scrolling,” Kristin Morency Goldman, spokesperson for The Toy Association, says in an email. “Squishing can also calm the nervous system and help the brain focus, so squishy toys are often used by educators and counselors to help children unwind when overstimulated or stressed out."
She adds: “Apart from those benefits, squishy toys are fun to collect and trade — and collectors love to share their latest finds on social media. Once a squishy goes viral, it sells out fast.”
With a business that seems driven by whims, how does Bench stay ahead of the trends?
“I'm the biggest creator in that [fidget toy] space. I kind of lead what goes viral, so that helps,” says Bench, who has been posting on social media daily since March 2020. “But also, I have my ear to the ground….I'm seeing what other people are creating, so I can see quickly when trends are coming and what they're going to be. We just have to order fast and try to have it in stock.”
When the trend was Poppits — items that pop like “endless bubble wrap,” Bench says — she had those in stock. As attention shifted to other sensory toys like “dumplings” and “jumbos,” she had those too.
“But we've also learned it's better to sell out than to be left with a lot of existing inventory,” Bench says. “So we try to be careful; we order it fast, but we order it in quantities that we know will sell. And it's better to reorder than it is to be sitting with stock.”
The business is now on its third location since launching out of Bench’s home in 2020.
From 2023 to 2025, Fidget Toys Plus operated out of an 8,000-square-foot warehouse she had built off US 301 and Whitfield Avenue.
After purchasing the site off Whitfield for $240,000 in 2022, Bench sold it for $1.8 million in 2025, according to Manatee County property records. The owner of the surrounding parcels approached her about buying it, she says, and “it just felt like a really good deal.”
Since January, Fidget Toys Plus has been at 6481 Parkland Drive, where it leases the space. While it is a tighter fit at 3,000 square feet, Bench says she plans on staying.
“Ironically enough, we moved to a much smaller location, and then things exploded again,” Bench says. “Life's so unpredictable. We didn't know we were going to go majorly viral again in 2026.”
As the mother of three children ages 4 to 17 years old, Bench gets help from her family testing the products. Moving forward, she plans to continue to focus on creating content and providing experiences she finds interesting rather than following others.
“Social media is a huge part of my life, and I post every day without fail. But I have to do what's sustainable to me, and that's not following trends,” Bench says. “It’s using my background and what makes sense to me.”
When things go viral, “on one hand, it's just so exciting and fun, but on the other hand, since I've done this a few times now, I realize that it's just going to be an exciting blip, an exciting memory for me, an exciting milestone, and then things will settle back into how they usually are,” Bench says. “It’s something I am so thankful for, but I know it's not going to last forever.”
Rather than having a supersized store, “I'd rather just have this homey, cozy small business,” Bench says, “and make sure I'm profitable and sustainable.”
