Shop Spotlight: Anime and Manga Furoku and Zenin

If you've been collecting anime and manga related items for a long time you're eventually going to come across a furoku item. Furoku is a gift item given away with the purchase of a Japanese magazine often one of the phonebook style Shoujo magazines such as Ribon or Nakayoshi but do occasionally pop up with other releases. In the same vein there are zenin items which are items you mailed in for using coupons from the magazine. Due to these items never being commercially available they're often some of the rarest collectibles available.  We carry various Furoku and Zenin items:

This is a Sailor Moon Single Band-aid with and all over pattern of Usagi with Luna and Artemis on the packaging from Nakayoshi Magazine. For $5 it cane be one of the most unique pieces in your collection.

This adorable hand towel was a furoku from Afternoon magazine in the early 2000's. It made of lightweight fabric and has an all over monochromatic pattern of the goddesses.  It seems too pretty to use as a towel, but it would probably be beautiful framed or even just tacked to a bulletin board. It's $13 and could be a beautiful new addition to your Ah! My Goddess collection.

This Mermaid Melody box from Nakayoshi is probably one of the cutest pieces of Furoku we've ever seen with adorable images Rina, Lucia and Hanon in bathtubs.  It's light weight Cardboard that pops up into a fairly sizeable box, perfect for holding office supplies, jewelry or any other treasures you can think of. It can be making your desk, dresser or work station cuter for $9.

This Full Metal Alchemist Poster is from June 2005 issue of a Japanese magazine, but we're not sure of which one. It's double sided with this fantastic image of Roy and Riza on one side and an unknown to us anime on the other. Other than the original magazine folds in good condition, having never been displayed. A great piece for your collection for $9.

Stitch from Lilo and Stitch has quite a large following in Japan so we actually have several rare Japanese items featuring him. But this small plactic mini bag is on of our favorites. It would make a unique gift for any Stitch fan and is only $2.






 We have lots of various Furoku available (especially if you're a Sailor Moon or Disney fan) so it's likely we have a rarity you'd enjoy adding to your collection.

~Stephanie


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Collection Oddities: Sailor Moon Nakayoshi Luna Pencil Case

We really like collecting the Sailor Moon items that were Furoku or Zenin for Nakayosi Magazine. Most of the items feature unique art not found on any other items. Although they're unique most of these items aren't particularly weird. The Luna Pencil case however is an exception.

Somehow I remember Luna looking more like a cat less, like a fuzzy sausage.

This fuzzy black thing is a pencil case that's suppose to resemble Luna, though really the only indication of that is pointy ears and a crescent moon. I'm not sure what's going on with the little pink bowtie, you'd think they'd have at least wanted to make it yellow since that's the only ribbon you ever see her have. It is still pretty cute in a completely ridiculous manner.  The inside is probably the better part though:

It's hard to see because of the camera flash but the inner pocets have an all over pattern with Luna's head and Nakayosi. There are 5 compartments in all, but it only comes with two desk items, a pencil and a ruler. What they lack in quantity though they make up for in quality:

It is physically impossible not to fall in love with winking Luna. You might think you're immune to her charms, but you aren't. Notably we haven't actually tried to use either of these items, so we're not sure if they're functionally high quality, but in cuteness quality they're clearly a 10/10. The only weirdness is why Artemis' head is on top the pencil when it's otherwise a completely Luna set.

This item isn't completely cracked out insane like a lot of the other items we feature as it does have legitimate art and a pretty reasonable purpose.  A plush pencil case does sort of push the bounds of reasonable in general, but it's mostly the why the fuzzy sausage that only vaguely resembles Luna, that really makes it weird. It's cute in it's own way and we're pretty committed to getting anything with the moon cats on it so it's perfect in our collection.


~Stephanie

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