It's rush hour at Tokyo's Takadanobaba Station, and on the way home, Sarah Lu, a 19-year-old student, stopped at a capsule toy specialty store in the station. After 30 minutes of pacing back and forth, Lu inserts a 500-yen-coin ($3.17) and turns the handle. With the “Gacha Gacha” sound, out pops her surprise: a plastic capsule, the size of an apple, opens to a small planet Earth plushy.
Lu pays monthly visits to capsule toy specialty stores, where each machine stocks 4-6 varieties of the same toy, and each turn costs from ¥100 to ¥1000 ($0.63 to $6.35). She usually spends ¥500 to ¥1000 ($3.17 to $6.35) per visit, for toys such as a talking button that says, “I’m bothered” and a small ramen plushy with doodle face. “I like ones that are so abnormal that they become adorable,” said Lu, majoring in Creative Innovation at Musashino Art University.
Contents inside a capsule toy range from plastic figures of pets apologizing at press conferences to objects designed to befuddle you, like a headshot of complete stranger.
Once aimed exclusively at children, the capsule toy market is now driven by young women like Lu. The capsule toys were originally introduced to Japan from the United States in 1965 and became an instant hit among kids before it slumped during the pandemic. The market rebounded in 2022, with women between the ages of 20 and 39 fueling the growth, according to Hidekazu Imaizumi.
Imaizumi, the operation manager of Gachacoco, a chain capsule toy specialty store, manages 12 stores in Tokyo. “We are targeting this group by selling franchised capsule toys that women would like,” said Imaizumi.
Now the capsule toy market value in Japan mounted up to 72 billion yen (466 million dollars), seeing an 87% increase from 2021. “There’s still a lot of room for the market to grow in the future,” said Katsuhiko Onoo, the head of the Japan Capsule Toy Association.
About 65% of capsule toy designers and developers are women, so they know exactly how to attract other women, according to Onoo. While women like cute stuffed animals and hyper-realistic miniature of mundane objects, such as a payphone, they also enjoy practical objects such as tiny reusable grocery bags, the inspiration of a female designer when she had to pay for grocery bags all the time. “They design what they actually wanted themselves,” said Onoo.
The clever design of high-quality capsule toys is among the top attractions, according to a report by Aizu University. “Those cute little toys just make you want to collect,” said Jyokaso Xu, a 23-year-old graduate student studying 3D Art, who splurged 2400 yen (16 dollars) on capsule toys on a recent visit.
Chuqiao Zhang’s favorite capsule toy is a miniature notebook, half of the size of her palm, and flips open. It also doubles as a keychain with a plastic cover, so it won’t get dirty being carried around. “As a stationary collector, I knew I definitely wanted the notebook, the second I saw it,” said Zhang, a 24-year-old student who spent 500 yen that day to get the notebook.
Beyond the clever --- or practical --- designs, part of the lure is the surprise. Although capsule toys from the same machine differ only in color or character, certain variations are more sought. Lu reported that she wouldn’t buy the product if it weren’t in a capsule toy machine.
“In the same machine, there’re varieties that value more to me,” said Lu, and getting the ones that are valued beyond their price tag excites her the most.
To fulfill that need and always surprise consumers with new products, Imaizumi’s store, Gachacoco, regularly updates its inventory with 50 to 60 new releases per week. Imaizumi’s stores also have a weekly-updated staff’s pick corner where the toys are displayed on open shelves for consumers to touch and feel.
Sometimes the fun of capsule toys simply came from browsing new items and varieties. “Even if I’m not buying one, simply looking at the machines and seeing what’s available is stress-relieving. I like checking out the new releases, and getting inspiration,” said Lu.
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