Expensive oil, the economy and the weak dollar are effecting everything, so why should penguins be immune?  These past few months have seen soaring shipping costs because of the price of gas and transportation.  We've tried to absorb  these costs and not pass them on to our customers by not re-ordering some of our larger stuffed animals and using Priority Mail.  But, where our feathers have really hit the fan is when it comes to penguins we import from Europe.  Watches, toys, figurines and even some plush all waddle on over from the old country, and in the past year some prices have actually doubled. We've stopped carrying the popular LAKS adelie penguin watch as they simply became too expensive as well as a couple of other Euroguins, but  penguin popular demand necissitated our re-ordering the Castagna Bride & Groom and Penguin Lovers Figurines from Italy and will be available in July, even though the prices has more than doubled in the past year.  On the flip side our penguins are very inexpensive if you live in Europe and we've added many European penguin lovers to our customer igloo these past few months.