I’m not sure that anyone knows the answer to this but…what’s the deal with the character goods that 100 yen shops sell?
There is an off-brand 100 yen shop near me, not a Daiso or anything that is selling Kirby goods. Bags and stuff. Made me wonder about how that works out. There’s no way this shop is officially licensing stuff from Nintendo. It seems to be the same goods that are sold at Daiso.
Does anyone know how and what specific items 100 yen shops make profits on? And are the character goods officially licensed or are they bootleg? I don’t really care either way but it was something I’ve been curious about.
I guess I don’t really know the ins and outs of the 100 yen shop business. Thanks in advance for any info!
7 comments
Those Kirby goods are legitimate. A few different 100 Yen shops carry them.
They are licensed. Look at the back and you’ll find some copyright information. Note that any licensed thing is either 2x the price or 1/2 the quality.
Pokemon pencils are 800 yen in a stationery store, the same store is selling better quality ones for half the price.
Not Kirby, but Disney characters seem to be a mainstay of discount stores the world over.
Was it Cando? It always feels like the lower end of the bunch lol (go team Seria!).
The deal is that they buy huge volumes of products to sell so they can keep prices low. They’re legit; the quality is not the best but you don’t need the best paper in a notebook or stickers etc. The items over 100 yen are pretty decent (like some of the Disney princess stuff at Daiso).
Working in authenticity the last year, the one thing I’ve learned, whether you’re reselling used goods or new:
the concept of authenticity is a construct used for the sole purpose of benefiting the seller and no one else.
as I always say: if your $100 Air Jordans have only one “fake” identifier (which in 90%+ cases even the most ardent fan couldn’t spot without a magnifying glass or photo reference) but are the color, design you like, fit well, are comfortable and satisfactorily fill all your requirements… who gives a fuck? pay 5x the cost for the privilege of owning the “real”/”legit” material if you have the money and the passion… but otherwise?
real or fake, official or otherwise, if the goods you like do what you want and need, go get ’em. Literally no one except a subset of rich boy nerds actually care
huge collector of kirby merch here: everything is legit! kirby, and by extension, hello kitty and other super popular IP’s like that get merchandise of the most random things and put in the most random places. my local daiso has kirby alcohol wipes and balloons and even little figurines and keychains. im sure manufacturing plastic toys and putting a character on the packaging for some wipes is super cheap.
either way, it’s fun to go to an unassuming store and get random, cheap, official merch like that. my wallet has not known peace since i’ve moved here 😭
I think the dirty little secret of IP licensing is that it’s actually a very easy, and *relatively* inexpensive process, but companies don’t like to advertise that so they’re not flooded with out of spec requests from randos
Like with Disney goods, for example, they have a whole website with contact emails for the different divisions.
Same deal with Daiso, Seria, etc… (or even something like Walmart in North America): they’re established chains, which makes licensing easier, and they have huge purchasing power so they can get big volume discounts.
There’s loss-leaders, of course, but if they’re selling a branded sticky-note set for 100yen, they maybe only paid 10yen for it.