Some people think that trendy toys are so popular not only because of their potential huge appreciation space, or the driving force of celebrities and senior players but also because of their unconstrained shapes and attitudes towards life. In this fast-developing era, trend toys, with their unique forms of artistic expression, convey distinctive beliefs in the trend of fashion.
Let’s look at Medicom Toy, which is a famous toy manufacturer from Japan. It was formally established in Japan in 1996 by Akashi Tatsuhiko. The reason why Medicom Toy has established its leadership as a Japanese toy manufacturer is that it is both large in scale and sophisticated in manufacturing, which makes Medicom Toy maintain a good reputation in the industry. Medicom Toy has franchised stores and authorized stores throughout Japan as well as online stores on the official website. In 2016, Medicom Toy’s annual sales reached 4.24 billion yen.
Medicom Toy has grown into a trendy toy kingdom
Before founding Medicom Toy, Akashi Tatsuhiko had designed several dolls. His first attempt was to make “Lupin III” and “Iron Man 28” related dolls. On account of the love of animation and manga, Medicom Toy, like most Japanese model play companies, launched most of the humanoid toys related to animation in the early days.
In 2000, Medicom Toy launched a product that changed the company’s future-KUBRICK. KUBRICK is a building block toy with a body model similar to Lego. The KUBRICK series brought the first success for Akashi Tatsuhiko. After the series of toys were launched, they were widely loved by users and greatly increased the popularity of Medicom Toy. After the success of the KUBRICK series, Akashi began to add popular elements to toys to expand Medicom’s audience. For example, the cooperation with the “Grand Theft Auto” game series brought different image styles to his works. Based on KUBRICK, Medicom Toy’s most well-known series BE@RBRICK was born.
From humanoid toys to KUBRICK building block people to BE@RBRICK, Medicom Toy has achieved success step by step. In the case that the adult toy market is more occupied by ACG and film IP humanoid toys, Medicom Toy has expanded its audience with trendy toys by giving BE@RBRICK cultural significance. Therefore, it has developed from an ordinary toy company to a trendy toy kingdom.
Blind box sales are parallel to direct sales
In the sales of the BE@RBRICK series of products, Medicom Toy has adopted a combination of blind box sales and direct sales. The most classic style of BE@RBRICK is 100% basic. The basic models launched by the series are usually sold in the form of blind boxes.
Depending on the theme, the probability of each style will be different. Among them, the appearance probability of transparent style is 11.45%, the appearance probability of pattern style is 11.45%, and the appearance probability of hidden style is only 0.52%. BE@RBRICK blind boxes are usually sold in the form of 24 full boxes. In addition, there is also a single-blind box selling method.
The low price and the characteristic of the blind box make it popular with the public. The price of a whole box is almost equal to the price of an ordinary humanoid toy, which can be accepted by most consumers. At the same time, since blind boxes may contain the same styles or hidden models, the desire to collect and the psychology of gambling have also stimulated more consumers’ demand for blind boxes.
Medicom Toy is more than a toy company
Although BE@BRICK is the trademark of Medicom Toy, there are still many sub-brands and sub-projects in Medicom Toy. As a well-known toy company, Medicom Toy’s products are not limited to toys. It has set foot in products such as clothes, statues, alarm clocks, and rings.
BE@RTEE is a sub-brand of BE@RBRICK. Its products are mainly T-shirts and hoodies printed with BE@RBRICK patterns, as well as school bags, wallets, shopping bags, mugs, and other daily necessities. The price of T-shirts in BE@RTEE is relatively high. For example, most of the single-product prices are above 3,500 yen and the price of some rare co-branded models can reach 13,000 yen.
Although the production cost of T-shirts is very low, BE@RBRICK can sell at such a high price, mainly due to the brand premium brought by BE@RBRICK as a symbol of trend and fashion.
Choose X-Playground for Medicom Toy
Now can you understand why a toy bear can sell at a high price? On the one hand, it contains a wide variety of products either by well-known artists or cooperation with well-known IP. On the other hand, compared with the product itself, Medicom Toy’s non-toy products are more about selling culture and brand value. X-Playground offers 100% authentic Medicom Toy products. Feel free to shop at X-Playground!
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