The spanking-new L.L. Bean Kids’ catalog offers teddy bear backpacks, sport leggings, day hiker boots, quick-drying socks and more — all the latest attire for the hip and rugged outdoorsy child.

But when potential customers called the phone number listed in the Maine company’s Back-to-School ’99 catalog, they reached a business in Virginia.

1-800-LLB-KIDS turned out to be 1-800-SNAFU.

And the popular Freeport-based catalog giant is scrambling to minimize the damage.

Sources say a financial settlement is in the works for the victim, a Virginia business that suddenly found itself inundated with callers seeking such items as bear cub sherpa pullovers for high-altitude toddlers and children’s cargo vests with separate pockets for crayons, rulers and pencils.

“We guarantee everything except your grade,” the catalog promised its young, school-bound customers. But it couldn’t guarantee a correct phone number for catalog sales.

L.L. Bean declined to name the aggrieved Virginia company, other than to say it is a child-oriented business, or confirm its exact location. But spokeswoman Mary Rose MacKinnon said the firm corrected the problem as soon as its officials realized what had happened.

Now, when customers call, a Bean customer service representantive answers.

“Arrangements have been made for us to assume the incorrect phone number, to minimize the incovenience to our customers. We regret the error,” she said.

It seems that the correct number should have been 1-877-LLB-KIDS. But some L.L. Bean employee working on production of the catalog, believing that toll-free numbers begin with 800, changed it to 1-800-LLB-KIDS.

“You can see how that would happen,” said MacKinnon, sympathetically.

The new children’s catalog was one of about 50 published by the company famous for its Bean boot and flannel-lined blue jeans. The faulty catalog arrived in customers’ homes last week.

The error was detected almost immediately, said L.L. Bean’s public relations manager, Richard Donaldson.

“We picked up on the problem on the same day” that the catalogs arrived in people’s homes, he said.

Donaldson declined to say how many catalogs were mailed with the incorrect phone number, calling this “proprietary information.” Bean’s typically mails millions of the catalogs to homes in the United States and abroad.

But he said the Virginia business with the unfortunate phone number “was overwhelmed” by callers trying to order items from L.L. Bean’s children’s catalog.

He added that the employee who made the error was not fired or disciplined in any way. Still, the misstep was a blow to a company that prides itself on sensitivity to customer needs and careful marketing of its image.