
Funko Pop became a $686M business - jatsign
https://www.vox.com/the-goods/2019/8/13/20798910/funko-pop-vinyl-figurines-collectibles
======
onion2k
When I see the success of companies like Funko Pop I can't help but remember
Simon (Spaced, Shaun of the Dead, Star Wars, etc) Pegg's excellent essay[1] on
the infantilization of adults by modern culture, turning us all in to passive
consumers who want a magical superhero to turn up and save the day instead of
doing something ourselves.

" _We are made passionate about the things that occupied us as children as a
means of drawing our attentions away from the things we really should be
invested in, inequality, corruption, economic injustice etc. It makes sense
that when faced with the awfulness of the world, the harsh realities that
surround us, our instinct is to seek comfort, and where else were the majority
of us most comfortable than our youth?_ "

The fact that actual grown ups want to spend money on plastic caricatures of
their favourite movie characters is fine in itself, but only if we also take
responsibility of the state of the society we live in.

[1] [http://simonpegg.net/2015/05/19/big-mouth-strikes-
again/](http://simonpegg.net/2015/05/19/big-mouth-strikes-again/)

~~~
simias
I think there's something to be said about our modern, ultra-connected
existences, the omnipresence of entertainment and its influence on society.

Super hero movies and Funko Pops though? That doesn't seem particularly new to
me. The Epic of Gilgamesh tells the story of "Gilgamesh, king of Uruk, and
Enkidu, a wild man created by the gods to stop Gilgamesh from oppressing the
people of Uruk". Most of Greek mythology is about Gods behaving very much like
modern super heroes. Actually many modern super heroes are molded more or less
loosely on those. "Panem et circenses" is not a novel concept.

Let's not pretend that the average human being a century ago spent their days
reading avant-guarde literature and complex political essays.

~~~
jerf
"Let's not pretend that the average human being a century ago spent their days
reading avant-guarde literature and complex political essays."

Most of the reason it appears that way is that 100 years ago, only the most
educated had access to the writing and publishing that is now our primary
record of the time.

I am sympathetic to the idea that our intellectual culture has degraded, and
even sometimes argued in favor of that proposition on HN, but I also
acknowledge it's really hard to measure in light of the overwhelming
democratization of access to such things and the resulting anti-selection
effect, or removal of the previous selection effect, or however you like to
phrase it. Maybe that's a bad thing, maybe it's a good thing, it's a non-
trivial argument either way, but it certainly makes it hard to graph any of
the relevant qualities of our society over time.

------
fiblye
>CEO Brian Mariotti called his company “recession proof.”

Famous last words. When another major recession hits, one of the first costs
to be cut is plastic junk. These are just beanie babies with more Disney
branded characters. People will get sick of cluttering their house with dozens
of the same item with mild variations at some point, until the next “gotta
catch em all” toy comes out.

~~~
ptah
they have the last 100 or more "gotta catch em all" toys. essentially they are
monopolising the whole genre

------
ebg13
I get why people like figurines, but I don't understand how much love funkopop
specifically gets. Their model quality is just so poor. No detail. No
character expression. No differentiation between characters. They feel like
just the absolute lowest effort throwaways. There are so many great toy
modelers out there, and yet somehow the cheapest least effort one is the one
that people know about because it's the one that, for some terrible reason,
gets brand licensing deals.

edit: Just to add more...I mean...someone else linked this figure
[https://media.entertainmentearth.com/assets/images/e9792a6af...](https://media.entertainmentearth.com/assets/images/e9792a6afbaf4d7a857e3cb84a2f86c6lg.jpg)
Every single funkopop figure looks exactly like that with only slightly more
than a palette and hair swap. Compare that to the same series models from
Banpresto:
[http://www.banpresto.jp/prize/0008.html](http://www.banpresto.jp/prize/0008.html)

~~~
revicon
My Ron Swanson Funko is judging you for your lack of Funko Pop appreciation.
[https://i.imgur.com/aTIeVKi.jpg](https://i.imgur.com/aTIeVKi.jpg)

~~~
ebg13
Or maybe it's actually Tom Selleck or a young Sam Elliott or my dad. There's
no way to know. Your visual indicators are white person with brown hair and a
moustache who drinks liquids sometimes. It's not like there's only one of
those. But, just so you know, it's a little weird that you bought a doll
version of my dad.

------
jacksproit
Based on how the prices have been falling recently this seems like a puff
piece to try and prevent a full bubble pop. I wouldn't be sad to see them go.
There are a lot of sketchy scams around "mystery box" sales that are
essentially unlicensed unregulated lotteries. I suspect that some YouTube
personalities are complicit in the scams. The language used on many pop sites
is masterfully devious [https://popcollectorsalliance.com/resources/whats-a-
grail-wh...](https://popcollectorsalliance.com/resources/whats-a-grail-where-
do-i-find-one-learning-about-funko-grails/)

------
tehwebguy
Very impressive, but it’s a shame to me that the vinyl figure company to lock
down every IP imaginable has such horrible, dead eyes.

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fouc
Seems like a market that is inflated by collectors that are hoping it will be
worth more in the future. Could end up being another trading cards fiasco.

~~~
SmellyGeekBoy
Or Beanie Babies. Or Bitcoin. Human nature is a funny thing.

~~~
CPLX
Or garbage pail kids, or cabbage patch dolls. This phenomenon has been going
on forever.

------
tiborsaas
“OUR BRAND IDENTITY IS TO BE ABLE TO SAY THAT WE HAVE SOMETHING FOR LITERALLY
EVERYBODY”

Hmm, it's the thing everybody would advise against with a passion.

\- Who's your target customer?

\- Everybody.

\- Well good luck with that (snarky smily)

Good to see counter examples.

~~~
johnday
Disney springs to mind immediately. I suppose General Electric counts too?

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mkane848
Maybe for now, but everyone I know in my age group that was super into these
(23-28) is currently trying to sell them because they have too many and the
novelty wore off.

Feels basically like a Beanie Baby craze, except this time, the people who are
into actual quality or give off the hobbyist vibe go to other products like
Nendoroid.

------
jatsign
How strange. I posted this 2 days ago and it didn't make it to the front page,
but not for some reason it says I only posted it 6 hours ago?

~~~
grzm
Likely due to a mod re-upping the post as described here:

[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=11662380](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=11662380)

------
avian
Does anyone know how plastic figurines like that are cast? I've been recently
looking at some similar toys and they have many concave features and small
details that seem impossible to make with simple injection moulding (as in,
you wouldn't be able to remove them from the mould)

~~~
janekm
The remarkably simple answer is that they are pulled out of the mould while
still hot and flexible. Here's an article about the process with a youtube
video showing the casting process (in a very small-scale facility):
[http://rampage-toys.blogspot.com/2011/09/making-sofubi-
how-i...](http://rampage-toys.blogspot.com/2011/09/making-sofubi-how-it-all-
works.html)

~~~
avian
Interesting. Thank you for sharing this!

------
silveira
Here is an interesting video essay of the business of Funko Pop
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TJ513v8Pquw](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TJ513v8Pquw)
and looking the numbers, their future is very uncertain to say the least.

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slang800
Whoever came up with the idea of re-marketing children's toys to adults was a
genius. It combines the passive consumerism of kids with the expendable income
of adults in a way that simply wouldn't have been tolerated more than a few
decades ago.

------
ptah
the documentary on netflix is pretty interesting

