How much has the dragon ball franchise made?

Discussion regarding the entirety of the franchise in a general (meta) sense, including such aspects as: production, trends, merchandise, fan culture, and more.

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How much has the dragon ball franchise made?

Post by Totamo » Tue Mar 28, 2017 8:44 pm

I just read it was $5 billion.

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Re: How much has the dragon ball franchise made?

Post by Avenant » Tue Mar 28, 2017 9:16 pm

Is this number even calculable? So many people/companies own different rights to different aspects and intellectual properties within the DragonBall franchise that it should be next to impossible to get an accurate number. So I guess the questions should be a little more specific, because at this moment it's too generalized.
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Re: How much has the dragon ball franchise made?

Post by Jinzoningen MULE » Tue Mar 28, 2017 9:40 pm

Was it properly sourced?
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Re: How much has the dragon ball franchise made?

Post by nickzambuto » Tue Mar 28, 2017 9:55 pm

Although it's probably impossible to get an accurate number due to the aforementioned reasons, I am really curious to see someone with adequate knowledge give at least an idea of what range the franchise is worth in total. Apparently Toriyama is like, a super millionaire? I was really surprised when I read that. Apparently he was a millionaire just from Dr. Slump even, he didn't even need Dragon Ball. Is this true?

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Re: How much has the dragon ball franchise made?

Post by DBZAOTA482 » Tue Mar 28, 2017 10:54 pm

I read somewhere it made about $30 billion which is understandable because the franchise is like up there with TMNT and Star Wars in terms of popularity and influence.

Though it's higher than The Simpson ($12 billion) and Dragon Ball is definitely not as big as that series.
fadeddreams5 wrote:
DBZGTKOSDH wrote:... Haven't we already gotten these in GT? Goku dies, the DBs go away, and the Namekian DBs most likely won't be used again because of the Evil Dragons.
Goku didn't die in GT. The show sucked him off so much, it was impossible to keep him in the world of the living, so he ascended beyond mortality.
jjgp1112 wrote: Sat Jul 18, 2020 6:31 am I'm just about done with the concept of reboots and making shows that were products of their time and impactful "new and sexy" and in line with modern tastes and sensibilities. Let stuff stay in their era and give today's kids their own shit to watch.

I always side eye the people who say "Now my kids/today's kids can experience what I did as a child!" Nigga, who gives a fuck about your childhood? You're an adult now and it was at least 15 years ago. Let the kids have their own experience instead of picking at a corpse.

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Re: How much has the dragon ball franchise made?

Post by sintzu » Wed Mar 29, 2017 2:51 am

DBZAOTA482 wrote:Though it's higher than The Simpson, Dragon Ball is definitely not as big as that series.
It's probably bigger.

The simpsons is just an animated series while DB has that, movies, games, manga, etc.
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Re: How much has the dragon ball franchise made?

Post by precita » Wed Mar 29, 2017 3:21 am

Are you including all the merch with this, like the toys and videogames?

I mean if you count everything, not just the manga sales or anime ratings...it has to be....1 BILLION dollars. Or not.

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Re: How much has the dragon ball franchise made?

Post by Lord Beerus » Wed Mar 29, 2017 11:10 am

sintzu wrote:
DBZAOTA482 wrote:Though it's higher than The Simpson, Dragon Ball is definitely not as big as that series.
It's probably bigger.

The simpsons is just an animated series while DB has that, movies, games, manga, etc.
The Simpsons is not just an animated series. It has comics, books, video games, tons of other merchandise, the feature length movie which made more than all of the Dragon Ball movies combined...

The Simpson is waaaaaaaaaaaaaayyyy bigger than Dragon Ball. It has a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame for crying out loud.

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Re: How much has the dragon ball franchise made?

Post by ABED » Wed Mar 29, 2017 11:23 am

Plus, The Simpsons mark on pop culture is far greater. Say the name Homer, and immediately everyone knows who that is even if they haven't been living in a cave. Even if they've never seen an episode, they know Homer and Bart Simpson.
I read somewhere it made about $30 billion which is understandable because the franchise is like up there with TMNT and Star Wars in terms of popularity and influence.
I don't believe that. It's nowhere near Star Wars.
Last edited by ABED on Wed Mar 29, 2017 11:59 am, edited 1 time in total.
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Re: How much has the dragon ball franchise made?

Post by Avenant » Wed Mar 29, 2017 11:57 am

ABED wrote:Plus, The Simpsons mark on pop culture is far greater. Say the name Homer, and immediately everyone knows who that is if they haven't been living in a cave. Even if they've never seen an episode, they know Homer and Bart Simpson.
I read somewhere it made about $30 billion which is understandable because the franchise is like up there with TMNT and Star Wars in terms of popularity and influence.
I don't believe that. It's nowhere near Star Wars.
Yeah, I think some are letting their fandom cloud their judgement. Simpsons and Star Wars are definitely bigger. They both have entire theme park sections for crying out loud.
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Re: How much has the dragon ball franchise made?

Post by floofychan333 » Wed Mar 29, 2017 12:17 pm

Avenant wrote:
ABED wrote:Plus, The Simpsons mark on pop culture is far greater. Say the name Homer, and immediately everyone knows who that is if they haven't been living in a cave. Even if they've never seen an episode, they know Homer and Bart Simpson.
I read somewhere it made about $30 billion which is understandable because the franchise is like up there with TMNT and Star Wars in terms of popularity and influence.
I don't believe that. It's nowhere near Star Wars.
Yeah, I think some are letting their fandom cloud their judgement. Simpsons and Star Wars are definitely bigger. They both have entire theme park sections for crying out loud.
To be fair, DB has a room at Shueisha now and also has an international following, but it's clearly less popular than Star Wars.
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Re: How much has the dragon ball franchise made?

Post by DBZAOTA482 » Wed Mar 29, 2017 12:21 pm

Avenant wrote:
ABED wrote:Plus, The Simpsons mark on pop culture is far greater. Say the name Homer, and immediately everyone knows who that is if they haven't been living in a cave. Even if they've never seen an episode, they know Homer and Bart Simpson.
I read somewhere it made about $30 billion which is understandable because the franchise is like up there with TMNT and Star Wars in terms of popularity and influence.
I don't believe that. It's nowhere near Star Wars.
Yeah, I think some are letting their fandom cloud their judgement. Simpsons and Star Wars are definitely bigger. They both have entire theme park sections for crying out loud.
Dragon Ball has multiple theme parks too.
fadeddreams5 wrote:
DBZGTKOSDH wrote:... Haven't we already gotten these in GT? Goku dies, the DBs go away, and the Namekian DBs most likely won't be used again because of the Evil Dragons.
Goku didn't die in GT. The show sucked him off so much, it was impossible to keep him in the world of the living, so he ascended beyond mortality.
jjgp1112 wrote: Sat Jul 18, 2020 6:31 am I'm just about done with the concept of reboots and making shows that were products of their time and impactful "new and sexy" and in line with modern tastes and sensibilities. Let stuff stay in their era and give today's kids their own shit to watch.

I always side eye the people who say "Now my kids/today's kids can experience what I did as a child!" Nigga, who gives a fuck about your childhood? You're an adult now and it was at least 15 years ago. Let the kids have their own experience instead of picking at a corpse.

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Re: How much has the dragon ball franchise made?

Post by ABED » Wed Mar 29, 2017 12:58 pm

In America?
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Re: How much has the dragon ball franchise made?

Post by Hellspawn28 » Wed Mar 29, 2017 1:01 pm

DB is nowhere as big as Star Wars, Marvel, DC, The Simpsons and Star Trek. I do think the franchise is worth a lot since it's one of the most famous anime overseas. People who don't know anime or watch anime or read manga know what Dragon Ball is.
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Re: How much has the dragon ball franchise made?

Post by SaiyanGod117 » Wed Mar 29, 2017 1:30 pm

https://books.google.com/books?id=hEeDF ... rs&f=false
I don't know if it's credible or not looks credible, I was a little skeptical, but after I thought about it some more piece by piece, it seemed believable.

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Re: How much has the dragon ball franchise made?

Post by Kamiccolo9 » Wed Mar 29, 2017 1:51 pm

Avenant wrote:
ABED wrote:Plus, The Simpsons mark on pop culture is far greater. Say the name Homer, and immediately everyone knows who that is if they haven't been living in a cave. Even if they've never seen an episode, they know Homer and Bart Simpson.
I read somewhere it made about $30 billion which is understandable because the franchise is like up there with TMNT and Star Wars in terms of popularity and influence.
I don't believe that. It's nowhere near Star Wars.
Yeah, I think some are letting their fandom cloud their judgement. Simpsons and Star Wars are definitely bigger. They both have entire theme park sections for crying out loud.
I've seen people (on this forum, mind you), seriously argue that Dragon Ball is more popular than Christianity. People are stupid.
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Re: How much has the dragon ball franchise made?

Post by DBZAOTA482 » Wed Mar 29, 2017 1:59 pm

ABED wrote:In America?
It has several in Europe, Italy, Japan, and of course... Latin America where it's practically a religion.
fadeddreams5 wrote:
DBZGTKOSDH wrote:... Haven't we already gotten these in GT? Goku dies, the DBs go away, and the Namekian DBs most likely won't be used again because of the Evil Dragons.
Goku didn't die in GT. The show sucked him off so much, it was impossible to keep him in the world of the living, so he ascended beyond mortality.
jjgp1112 wrote: Sat Jul 18, 2020 6:31 am I'm just about done with the concept of reboots and making shows that were products of their time and impactful "new and sexy" and in line with modern tastes and sensibilities. Let stuff stay in their era and give today's kids their own shit to watch.

I always side eye the people who say "Now my kids/today's kids can experience what I did as a child!" Nigga, who gives a fuck about your childhood? You're an adult now and it was at least 15 years ago. Let the kids have their own experience instead of picking at a corpse.

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Re: How much has the dragon ball franchise made?

Post by ABED » Wed Mar 29, 2017 3:44 pm

DBZAOTA482 wrote:
ABED wrote:In America?
It has several in Europe, Italy, Japan, and of course... Latin America where it's practically a religion.
The Simpsons is a cultural touchstone and is on American primetime TV. America is more of an importer than exporter, but one of the big things we export is TV and movies. The Simpsons is iconic American TV. And Star Wars was responsible for the concept of the summer blockbuster (along with Jaws).
The biggest truths aren't original. The truth is ketchup. It's Jim Belushi. Its job isn't to blow our minds. It's to be within reach.
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Re: How much has the dragon ball franchise made?

Post by TheDevilsCorpse » Wed Mar 29, 2017 3:54 pm

Kamiccolo9 wrote:I've seen people (on this forum, mind you), seriously argue that Dragon Ball is more popular than Christianity. People are stupid.
C'mon, you know better than this. Start finding nicer ways to phrase your statements, or the free warnings are going transition to account strikes.
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Re: How much has the dragon ball franchise made?

Post by Kamiccolo9 » Wed Mar 29, 2017 6:18 pm

TheDevilsCorpse wrote:
Kamiccolo9 wrote:I've seen people (on this forum, mind you), seriously argue that Dragon Ball is more popular than Christianity. People are stupid.
C'mon, you know better than this. Start finding nicer ways to phrase your statements, or the free warnings are going transition to account strikes.
I apologize. Long day. No excuse, but your point is taken.

As a more polite rebuttal to some of the stuff mentioned in this thread, and as a method of providing some perspective at how Dragon Ball sales measure up to mega-franchises like Star Wars and Marvel, here's a very helpful post from MarcFBR that was in a recently necrobumped thread on this page:
MarcFBR wrote:Just to further point out.

Like multiple people have clarified from actually reading the Funimation sales catalogs, the numbers given are apparently lifetime merchandise sales from the entire world for Dragon Ball Z (which for the sake of argument we will assume are accurate.) This number is roughly $5 billion as of late last year (for the lifetime of the franchise.)

Based on various bits over the years we know that while Marvel did quite well once Iron Man came out that Marvel as a true unstoppable juggernaut began the year Avengers came out in theaters (2012.)

According to Advertising Age, in 2011 alone Marvel's merchandise did $6 billion in retail merchandise sales.
Dragon Ball is like a nice shiny (if a bit aged) horse that you trot around to show off to important guests. Stuff like Star Wars and Marvel? That's like busting in on your dinner party riding a fucking T-Rex. There's no comparison.
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