In our September/October issue, we asked four shop owners and managers to give us their predictions of what the top sellers would be at their respective stores. The results are in: Steven Burgert of I.D. predicted it would be the balloon stool from Umbra ($300). “The stool did very well,” he reports. “The ones in the shop sold immediately when they arrived and we had many requests for them as well. It is now on an indefinite back-order.” Devin Kirk of Jayson Home & Garden says this about the ram’s skull lamp ($675) on which he put his money: “This was far and away the top-selling new lamp of last year. What a relief, since my reputation was on the on the line!” (Editorial note: Reputations are definitely not at stake here.) Jonathan Goodman of Elements was quite pleased with his bet as well—a monogrammed metal tray for $650. “We sold 12 of them,” he says. “Not bad for a $700 tray.” What recession? The people need trays! The one pick gone awry was Orange Skin’s Graunk Enzenberger’s: the egg-shaped footrest ($987). “We had tons of inquiries but no orders yet on the footstool,” he says. The surprise big seller there was the Pasmore lounge chair (around $5,400 in leather, shown above), which sat for a while on the showroom floor before it got any bites. “A little unusual that it was suddenly so popular since it’s expensive, but that’s how these things go sometimes,” he said.

—Gina Bazer