Mass Merchandising

One popular item is a T-shirt for Build-a-Bear stuffed bears. The $6 shirt, with the Christ Our Hope logo, is available at six Washington area Build-a-Bear stores.

"It just seemed like a fun thing to do," said Susan Gibbs, spokeswoman for the Archdiocese of Washington. "It's very child-friendly."

Gibbs said the money the archdiocese makes will be used to defray the estimated $3 million cost of the pope's visit, although souvenir sales are not expected to amount to a large percentage of that amount.

"We're not looking at merchandising as being a major funding source for the papal visit," Gibbs said. "Most of the money is coming from donations. This is just a small part."

Proceeds from the souvenir sales will go toward the general operating costs of the basilica, said Jacquelyn Hayes, a spokeswoman.

Marketers of Catholic products say that a pope's visit isn't a huge generator of memorabilia sales compared with, say, a big rock-and-roll tour coming to town.

"It's not a Bruce Springsteen concert where you're going to have tons of product out there," said Alan Napleton, president of the Catholic Marketing Network, a consortium of Catholic gift stores and suppliers. He said Catholic products -- books, apparel, DVDs and other items -- are a small fraction of the Christian merchandising market, estimated at $4 billion to $6 billion annually.

Catholic groups acknowledge that there isn't much they can do about unlicensed pope-related products -- such as pope bobbleheads and the Pope's Cologne -- as long as the products don't use the official U.S. trip logo.

The Pope's Cologne was developed by California doctor Fred Hass, who says the scent is derived from the private formula of Pius IX, who was pope from 1846 to 1878. Hass developed the product two years ago, and it was picked up by Monastery Greetings, an Ohio company that markets religion-themed items, in anticipation of the pope's visit.

And where did Hass find the 19th-century pope's secret formula? In a cookbook his sister in Towson, Md., sent to him.