Why isn't Bandai stepping in?

[astral brick]

Considering the amount and the relevance of Bandai licences, they could cover every theme:

- Space: Gundam

- Super Heroes: Dragon Ball

- Ninja: Naruto

- Pirates: One Piece (if there aren't issues with Nanoblock's rights)

- City: a random IP including Tokyo's famous attractions

In relation to Bandai's resources and years of experience in selling Gunpla and high quality toys such as the Chogokin line, if they had a serious intention of getting into the business of interlocking plastic bricks, they could be the company able to break the monopoly.

In every market a true competition is always welcome.

[Mylenium]

I'm not sure if this would ever happen. True, they have the manufacturing skills and capacity, but I also see several conflicts of interest, as they are e.g. also one of the Star Wars licensees for scale models and collectible figures. Outside that I'm pretty sure they are watching the market closely, but it's probably fair to say that neither of us knows enough about the Asian markets and regional competitors like Oxford or the various Chinese manufacturers to even come close to an assessment how viable it would be for them to compete in this field. I would imagine that if they ever decided to get into brick-based stuff, that's how they'd start, too, before expanding from Asia across the globe.

Mylenium

[Hagane87]

They actually DID some of that stuff under the Mega Bloks label, including Gundam, One Piece, Kamen Rider, Super Sentai and Pokemon.

Heck, they even made some CCBS-esque figures for Digimon and Dragonball https://www.amazon.com/Digimon-Universe-Monsters-Appmon-Figure/dp/B01N2VHQH8

[Lyichir]

I'm more than a little confused by the premise of the article, not just in terms of what it's asking but also why it's asking it. Is your primary interest in having building toys of these brands, or is it to "break the monopoly" (as you put it) and compete directly with Lego on its own turf?

I think there are some pretty strong reasons why Bandai might not be exceptionally keen on breaking into that space. Lego's business model, in terms of their production output, is a lot different from other toy brands. For many toys, particularly model kits like Gundam, parts are designed more on a per product basis, engineered for a very particular individual use. This allows for the kind of high detail you describe, but at the expense of versatility—a Gundam kit is designed to build one particular model, not to be rebuilt into other things. Breaking into the building toy space Lego occupies would require a hefty up-front investment to design a full range of more versatile bricks, and to really be rebuildable to the extent of Lego it might have to sacrifice some of the accuracy fans of the franchise expect from it. The alternative—relying on a large number of bespoke parts—would be a middle ground that would risk satisfying neither fans of high detail models or of rebuildable building toys. It would be much easier, and arguably more effective, for a brand like that to partner with an existing building toy manufacturer like Lego or Mega Construx that already has the difficult groundwork of designing an overarching system laid for them, and tailor it to the specific needs of the brands being adapted.

[koalayummies]

Fun fact: executive vice president of marketing Mads Nipper described The Lego Group's 2004 perils as making the company "almost bankrupt". Only eight years later they became the "most valuable toy company" and just eleven years after near doom they had fully recovered and then some to become "the world's largest toy company by revenue".

[astral brick]

8 hours ago, Lyichir said:

It would be much easier, and arguably more effective, for a brand like that to partner with an existing building toy manufacturer like Lego or Mega Construx that already has the difficult groundwork of designing an overarching system laid for them, and tailor it to the specific needs of the brands being adapted.

Yes, you are right, a partnership with Lego - can we really take other companies seriously? - would be more efficient for Bandai, but the problem is that, most likely, it is not going to happen because both brands, which are making business in the toy market, will lose more than they could gain. In the meantime, average Lego customers can't enjoy the brick versions of famous Bandai's licences and afols are deceiving themselves by submitting to Ideas amazing projects that, in spite of being allowed, will never be produced.   

[KotZ]

On 12/28/2020 at 11:23 PM, astral brick said:

Yes, you are right, a partnership with Lego - can we really take other companies seriously? - would be more efficient for Bandai, but the problem is that, most likely, it is not going to happen because both brands, which are making business in the toy market, will lose more than they could gain. In the meantime, average Lego customers can't enjoy the brick versions of famous Bandai's licences and afols are deceiving themselves by submitting to Ideas amazing projects that, in spite of being allowed, will never be produced.   

I think you're trying to see the forest through the trees. Or how is that saying go?

Anyway, there's a LOT of money in licensing. Believe me. I've been on that side of stuff. Licensing makes a lot of money with (relatively) little skin in the game (if you're the one doing the licensing. We've seen the lucrative deals with LEGO and Big Bang Theory, Voltron, etc. Of course LEGO's best licensing deal is Star Wars. LEGO is now doing deals with Nintendo with Mario, which is Nintendo's biggest and most recognizable property.

And so what LEGO fans can't enjoy Bandai licenses? As a pure LEGO fan, I can't enjoy HALO or similar? Do I care? No. I pay LEGO for the quality, name, etc. Bandai can make their foray into buildable bricks, but it's way too expensive. Not only do they have to compete with LEGO, but they have to fight Mega, Oxford, Chinese knockoffs, and everything else. It's easier to license.

So why aren't they? Because neither company sees it necessary to do it yet. Bandai is an incredibly niche product. While A LOT of people love Bandai brands, they can mainly name the specific licenses (Pokemon, One Piece, etc). Bandai is like Nintendo but a step or two lower. Bandai, right now, is better to license off the brands, which they are doing with Hasbro, etc.

And IDEAs isn't for AFOLs to get the most incredible set ever out to the public. It's for LEGO to farm talent and ideas for non-licensed products. And ypou're forgetting Bricklink's (owned by LEGO now) push to get AFOl projects into the hands of people.

[MatthewRC]

Hey, guys. I believe you’d better see this on Brickipedia.

https://brickipedia.fandom.com/wiki/Bandai

 

LEGO and Bandai once partnered back in 1999. Interesting!

[KotZ]

1 minute ago, MatthewRC said:

Hey, guys. I believe you’d better see this on Brickipedia.

https://brickipedia.fandom.com/wiki/Bandai

 

LEGO and Bandai once partnered back in 1999. Interesting!

Interesting! What a weird licesncing deal though. Honestly how did THAT get signed off?

[MatthewRC]

I’m guessing that Bandai Japan is more than a toy company, it’s an entertainment giant!

[Peppermint_M]

Free sets with certain purchases would be my guess. Bandai has a lot of branded products beyond the toys, the promotions a lot of brands do with LEGO rarely match well.

Back in the late 90s earlly 00s, I had a few very small sets that came promotionally with different products. We got about a Dozen of SubZero because they came free with purchases of frozen food by Birdseye and Walls, so the usual fishfingers we kids loved to eat had free LEGO! Also, randomly Stunt Flyer was packaged free with some snack or cookie/biscuit box as I recall convincing mum to get them on the strength of "We like those and it has LEGO" .