Business Notes HIT PRODUCTS

What are round and orange, wear toothy grins and sit in the middle of front + lawns across the U.S.? No, not pumpkins. They're Stuff-A-Pumpkins, giant plastic leaf bags with a jack-o'-lantern design. When filled to the brim with lawn rakings, the 260-gal. monsters seem large enough to devour a small child. A creation of Connecticut-based Sun Hill Industries, the Stuff-A-Pumpkin (retail price: $3.98) is flying off the shelves of K mart, Wal-Mart and other bargain behemoths, suddenly making the childhood chore of leaf raking such a cool job that even Bart Simpson might volunteer.

The Stuff-A-Pumpkin's popularity has prompted an outbreak of plastic-bag thefts, leaves and all. A Houston family ended a string of such heists by coating the bags with grip-defying petroleum jelly. Benson Zinbarg, Sun Hill's president and founder, safeguards his own Stuff-A-Pumpkin by weighing it down with bricks.