DBS Merchandising in review: Clearing some big misconceptions & what we've actually learned.

[Baggie_Saiyan]

Preface: I think this deserves it's own topic and I think people over on the merch thread are fed up of me ranting all the time, so one big rant to end them all!

Question: How can a show be marketed so much and at the same time barely be marketed?

Answer:

To begin to answer this question we have to go all the way back to 2015. A new DBZ movie came out spring of the year, DB Kai was on air set to end in the summer. DB was in a bit of a bloom and then DBS is announced but beyond that basically the first 6 months of it's airing aka the rest of 2015 will be retelling movies and one of which just came out during the same here that they already marketed and merched. So with DBS 2015 was a really awkward year on how to merchandise it, because essentially they had to make BoG relevant again only for them to make it irrelevant again if that makes sense, so BoG basically got the light end of the candle here, while Bandai were releasing a lot of "smaller" merch basic stuff kids can pick up with loose change there wasn't anything major for BoG until the end of 2015 when the current main prize figure line, Chouzoushu, decided to adopt DBS and started off with a SSG Goku before moving on to Resurrection "F" with a Beerus and BAse Vegeta in "F" outfit and then a base Goku in F gi and then a Champa*.

Aside from that Resurrection "F" pretty much was the front and centre of early DBS merchandising as expected, towards the end of 2015 the SCultures 5 joint winners, KOZO and Nakazawa sculpted a SPECIAL release of SSGSS Goku vs Golden Freeza respectively under the DBS brand name. 2015 was only home to a Goku vs Freeza Ichiban Kuji release but shared both the DBS and Z branding. So thus 2015 came to and end and to be honest it was just what one would expect, ResF would still get the majority of the merchandising and marketing and that is exactly what happened... then 2016 happened and it was a disaster.

So 2016... the missed year. So the year started off with Banpresto releasing more volumes of their two on going regular prize figure lines the previously mentioned Chouzoushu and the Master Stars Piece line and both of these ended in March... Just as soon as the U6 was heating up, the Chouzoushu ended with that Goku and Champa volume and the MSP line with base Gotenks and we didn't get a new main prize figure line until January 2017.... 9 months without a main prize figure line. Instead Banpresto focused on getting their Z dramatic showcase and Resolution of Soldiers line's out. However the yearly SCultures line was completely under the DBS brand which was a yay............only to find out that of the 6 figures there would only be 3 characters (2 18's, 2 SS2 Goku's and 2 SS3 Goku's) The Goku's had gi with Kanji on and came out around the Trunks arc so they were DBS related then. Also during the summer they released these special Genki Dama Base and SS Goku's under the DBS brand despite it obviously being Z. Sensing a pattern?

Main Bandai also didn't know what they heck they were doing. Their current monthly UDM mini keychain gashapon was moving as per usual but despite under the DBS branding they would only had like a couple DBS related characters per set and a lot of the time was the same old same. They started a new gashapon line "Scene Selection" as you can see more NON DBS related characters taking up stupid space, a stoned Krillin that is so f**cking lazy they didn't want to colour another figure.This is just the tip. Worse the thing was this gashapon line ended here... and another didn't get picked up until the end of the Trunks arc when they released the "VS" gashpon set in December....

Even Banpresto's WCF line didn't get to the U6 stuff until MARCH 2017!

2016 was f**king shambolic. But it doesn't end there 2016 had a MAJOR release in the brand new Ichiban Kuji SUPER MASTER STARS PIECE THE SON GOKU and it was under specific DBS branding.... oh my god so exciting. I wonder what it could be, SSGSS KK Goku? Oh wait no it's Namek Goku from Z... The DBS logo is there front and centre.... the add more salt in the wounds... they released the same thing a few months later with 2 additional colourings...

So to summarise, in show DBS had two new materiel arcs in the U6 arc and Trunks arc... both of which were barely scratched upon in terms of merchandising... synergizing with the show SHOULD have been number one priority, like they're doing with UI Goku- which is no coincidence that it happens as the show is f**king ending the month it makes it debut! In terms of non figure merchandising like lunch boxes etc this didn't happen for the Trunks arc until near the end of the damn arc... lord give me strength.

So 2017, the decent year. So with the shambolic 2016 over and with the prospect of a the U.S arc looming over.... they have to play catch up and so 9 months after their main Prize lines ended they started the a new one, their DXF release starting with Future Trunks in January and thus having to skip over the U6 arc. After vol 1 each DXF release would have 2 figures per set which was great... only to find out it would re-use a mould from the previous set's new figure.... thus making it even longer to get new characters to be released... On top of that the releases aren't great suffer primarily from mediocre paintjobs.

SSGSSKK did get a one off release.... only to find the aura came separate and was limited to about 1 aura released per 6 of the figure... thus making the release essentially worthless.

March the WCF's finally moved onto releasing new material stuff starting with the U6 arc and then copy Vegeta a few months later and then Trunks arc more months later and then baseball episodes and ending at some of the ToP fighters in Sept before the main WCF line came to f**cking end... with Jiren and Kale (the only substantial release for her btw) being the only new fighters they released....

Let's see what is going on over at main Bandai meanwhile well their UDM line is chugging along same old same use of a few characters, but in a massive twist the VS gashapon line continued... oh. my god... going back to the BoG arc, Goku vs Beerus maybe Vegeta and Whis too or something... oh Broly and SS4 Gogeta... but it wasn't until vol 5 when it was just to dumb to comprehend... U.S arc set... Base Goku vs #17 cool and SSGSS Vegeta vs.... Kale... nope SS3 Broly LMAO what the f**ck is wrong with them? Kale f**cking exists she is right there! What is the point of her if they aren't gonna do anything with her? How does SS3 Broly make any sense here?

After the SUPER MASTER STARS PIECE THE SON GOKU it only made sense to do a THE VEGETA. Unlike Goku we can at least say Okay this can be DBS related as Vegeta has used SS in Cell arc attire.

So before we wrap up 2017 there were two more interesting things here, Son Goku got his own Prize Figure line the DBS Son Goku FES line... sculpted by legendary sculptor Nakazawa... however if one thought this was gonna stop Goku bleeding into other line...yeah no. Despite the line starting off with SSGSS Goku it went on to have SS Namek Goku, Saiyan arc Base Goku, Kid Goku, SS3 Buu arc Goku... before finally getting back to DBS with Goku Black only for it to then go SS4 Goku and Gogeta... all under the nice heathly brand name of DBS, feels good man.

It is beginning to feel a lot like identity fraud at this point.

However 2017 isn't over yet, Banpresto brought back regular Ichiban Kuji and their sheer laziness in full force, granted the IBK's were off a higher quality than previous regular IBK's but their laziness is there for all to see.

ToP regular merchandising didn't start like the Trunks arc until near the end of the year... bit with no UI Goku visit just regular SSGSS... UI Goku wouldn't have happened to late into the arc if they simply wanted to create it for "merchandising reasons". Sure it is getting quite a bit March 2018 and beyond but it has too as the show is freaking ending.

Now on to 2018, schedules up to September and no indication of Vegeta's new form, so we're 9 months and counting for that. Nothing to imply we'll see anymore new ToP fighters*, still a plethora of SSGSS merch and SSR Black. After UI hype in early 2018, DBS and DB in general is slowly now petering out as we head to the end of the year.

*Jiren the only fighter with any sort of merchandising I could call significant from promo art, to mini figures to premium releases. Beyond him Kale/Caulifla got a couple stickers and mini figure, same for Kafla and Bergamo and mouse GoD got a mini keychain and that was it. That is it for the new characters. So much so for "merchandising the arc". I am sure many would agree Jiren is the least marketable out of the new fighters but got the most because he was relevant to the story and that is the the story of this merchandising of DBS in a nutshell, they're scared to branch away and get out their comfort zones, plenty of characters that could have been proven to be merchandise gold mines have been given no thought, I mean Hit alone could and would have been gold dust for them. But instead they want to use the good faith of DBS to shift they're shitty Z and GT stuff and it is pretty disgusting as once characters have no on screen relevance anymore they cannot be marketed again. In 3 years they can't suddenly be like oh shit let's market Anirazza now...

SSG Goku made an anime comeback but the merch people treated it as non-existent and we're like oh here have a UDM or candy release, despite SSG (along with Jiren) voted to come back as part of UDM re-release later... they did nothing with it. Why? Cuz they don't want to go out their comfort zone, god forbid they actually put some effort it y'know.

So what have we learned?

SSGSS was immensely popular, it was the main merchandising (like lunch boxes, pencils etc) visual for 4 arcs in a row, so many and all sorts of figure releases and SSGSS stuff would hardly drop in price and in fact in some cases go up.

Jiren merch had a slow start as expected as he basically did nothing until the special and after that he's been going pretty well, voted in the UDM re-release, getting even a re-released premium bandai set (along with Goku and Zen-Oh), this never happened with the Trunks arc sets btw that tells you what you need to know!

Conclusion and final thoughts:

Poor planning, laziness and the refusal to get out their comfort zones make DBS merch in general pretty shambolic to be honest, sure thing picked up in 2017 and 2018 looked amazing only to find out it was cuz they show was ending... kinda funny that they finally get off their arse and do something when the show is ending and knowing they had to capitalise on UI Goku. Looks like the boat has sailed on all the other characters they missed.

The show wasn't made "to sell toys" it is about as far from the truth as possible, as I hope you all can now understand. If so SSG Goku would've been marketed, SSG Vegeta would've been a thing, UI Goku should have been the main visual for main merchandising not SSGSS Goku again. Other Saiyans would have got SSGSS given it's immeasurable popularity, the U6 Saiyans and Kale in particular should have been all over the shop instead of f**king Broly.

If they show comes back I hope they plan this shit properly like they did UI Goku, I mean the retellings should have gven them a leg up but instead we've been playing catch up because of a woeful 2016...

[ToshioWrites]

Is there any Toppo or Dyspo stuff ?

[Baggie_Saiyan]

Is there any Toppo or Dyspo stuff ?

Nope. Nothing. Nadda. Zilch. Zero. (Well there's a couple small stickers that come with some sweets...)

But Broly yeah there's plenty of him!

[majinwarman]

Preface: I think this deserves it's own topic and I think people over on the merch thread are fed up of me ranting all the time, so one big rant to end them all!

Question: How can a show be marketed so much and at the same time barely be marketed?

Answer:

To begin to answer this question we have to go all the way back to 2015. A new DBZ movie came out spring of the year, DB Kai was on air set to end in the summer. DB was in a bit of a bloom and then DBS is announced but beyond that basically the first 6 months of it's airing aka the rest of 2015 will be retelling movies and one of which just came out during the same here that they already marketed and merched. So with DBS 2015 was a really awkward year on how to merchandise it, because essentially they had to make BoG relevant again only for them to make it irrelevant again if that makes sense, so BoG basically got the light end of the candle here, while Bandai were releasing a lot of "smaller" merch basic stuff kids can pick up with loose change there wasn't anything major for BoG until the end of 2015 when the current main prize figure line, Chouzoushu, decided to adopt DBS and started off with a SSG Goku before moving on to Resurrection "F" with a Beerus and BAse Vegeta in "F" outfit and then a base Goku in F gi and then a Champa*.

Aside from that Resurrection "F" pretty much was the front and centre of early DBS merchandising as expected, towards the end of 2015 the SCultures 5 joint winners, KOZO and Nakazawa sculpted a SPECIAL release of SSGSS Goku vs Golden Freeza respectively under the DBS brand name. 2015 was only home to a Goku vs Freeza Ichiban Kuji release but shared both the DBS and Z branding. So thus 2015 came to and end and to be honest it was just what one would expect, ResF would still get the majority of the merchandising and marketing and that is exactly what happened... then 2016 happened and it was a disaster.

So 2016... the missed year. So the year started off with Banpresto releasing more volumes of their two on going regular prize figure lines the previously mentioned Chouzoushu and the Master Stars Piece line and both of these ended in March... Just as soon as the U6 was heating up, the Chouzoushu ended with that Goku and Champa volume and the MSP line with base Gotenks and we didn't get a new main prize figure line until January 2017.... 9 months without a main prize figure line. Instead Banpresto focused on getting their Z dramatic showcase and Resolution of Soldiers line's out. However the yearly SCultures line was completely under the DBS brand which was a yay............only to find out that of the 6 figures there would only be 3 characters (2 18's, 2 SS2 Goku's and 2 SS3 Goku's) The Goku's had gi with Kanji on and came out around the Trunks arc so they were DBS related then. Also during the summer they released these special Genki Dama Base and SS Goku's under the DBS brand despite it obviously being Z. Sensing a pattern?

Main Bandai also didn't know what they heck they were doing. Their current monthly UDM mini keychain gashapon was moving as per usual but despite under the DBS branding they would only had like a couple DBS related characters per set and a lot of the time was the same old same. They started a new gashapon line "Scene Selection" as you can see more NON DBS related characters taking up stupid space, a stoned Krillin that is so f**cking lazy they didn't want to colour another figure.This is just the tip. Worse the thing was this gashapon line ended here... and another didn't get picked up until the end of the Trunks arc when they released the "VS" gashpon set in December....

Even Banpresto's WCF line didn't get to the U6 stuff until MARCH 2017!

2016 was f**king shambolic. But it doesn't end there 2016 had a MAJOR release in the brand new Ichiban Kuji SUPER MASTER STARS PIECE THE SON GOKU and it was under specific DBS branding.... oh my god so exciting. I wonder what it could be, SSGSS KK Goku? Oh wait no it's Namek Goku from Z... The DBS logo is there front and centre.... the add more salt in the wounds... they released the same thing a few months later with 2 additional colourings...

So to summarise, in show DBS had two new materiel arcs in the U6 arc and Trunks arc... both of which were barely scratched upon in terms of merchandising... synergizing with the show SHOULD have been number one priority, like they're doing with UI Goku- which is no coincidence that it happens as the show is f**king ending the month it makes it debut! In terms of non figure merchandising like lunch boxes etc this didn't happen for the Trunks arc until near the end of the damn arc... lord give me strength.

So 2017, the decent year. So with the shambolic 2016 over and with the prospect of a the U.S arc looming over.... they have to play catch up and so 9 months after their main Prize lines ended they started the a new one, their DXF release starting with Future Trunks in January and thus having to skip over the U6 arc. After vol 1 each DXF release would have 2 figures per set which was great... only to find out it would re-use a mould from the previous set's new figure.... thus making it even longer to get new characters to be released... On top of that the releases aren't great suffer primarily from mediocre paintjobs.

SSGSSKK did get a one off release.... only to find the aura came separate and was limited to about 1 aura released per 6 of the figure... thus making the release essentially worthless.

March the WCF's finally moved onto releasing new material stuff starting with the U6 arc and then copy Vegeta a few months later and then Trunks arc more months later and then baseball episodes and ending at some of the ToP fighters in Sept before the main WCF line came to f**cking end... with Jiren and Kale (the only substantial release for her btw) being the only new fighters they released....

Let's see what is going on over at main Bandai meanwhile well their UDM line is chugging along same old same use of a few characters, but in a massive twist the VS gashapon line continued... oh. my god... going back to the BoG arc, Goku vs Beerus maybe Vegeta and Whis too or something... oh Broly and SS4 Gogeta... but it wasn't until vol 5 when it was just to dumb to comprehend... U.S arc set... Base Goku vs #17 cool and SSGSS Vegeta vs.... Kale... nope SS3 Broly LMAO what the f**ck is wrong with them? Kale f**cking exists she is right there! What is the point of her if they aren't gonna do anything with her? How does SS3 Broly make any sense here?

After the SUPER MASTER STARS PIECE THE SON GOKU it only made sense to do a THE VEGETA. Unlike Goku we can at least say Okay this can be DBS related as Vegeta has used SS in Cell arc attire.

So before we wrap up 2017 there were two more interesting things here, Son Goku got his own Prize Figure line the DBS Son Goku FES line... sculpted by legendary sculptor Nakazawa... however if one thought this was gonna stop Goku bleeding into other line...yeah no. Despite the line starting off with SSGSS Goku it went on to have SS Namek Goku, Saiyan arc Base Goku, Kid Goku, SS3 Buu arc Goku... before finally getting back to DBS with Goku Black only for it to then go SS4 Goku and Gogeta... all under the nice heathly brand name of DBS, feels good man.

It is beginning to feel a lot like identity fraud at this point.

However 2017 isn't over yet, Banpresto brought back regular Ichiban Kuji and their sheer laziness in full force, granted the IBK's were off a higher quality than previous regular IBK's but their laziness is there for all to see.

ToP power regular merchandising didn't start like the Trunks arc until near the end of the year... bit with no UI Goku visit just regular SSGSS... UI Goku wouldn't have happened to late into the arc if they simply wanted to create it for "merchandising reasons". Sure it is getting quite a bit March 2018 and beyond but it has too as the show is freaking ending.

Now on to 2018, schedules up to September and no indication of Vegeta's new form, so we're 9 months and counting for that. Nothing to imply we'll see anymore new ToP fighters*, still a plethora of SSGSS merch and SSR.Black. After UI hype in early 2018, DBS and DB in general is slowly now petering out as we head to the end of the year.

*Jiren the only fighter with any sort of merchandising I could call significant from promo art, to mini figures to premium releases. Beyond him Kale/Caulifla got a couple stickers and mini figure, same for Kafla and Bergamo and mouse GoD got a mini keychain and that was it. That is it for the new characters. So much so for "merchandising the arc". I am sure many would agree Jiren is the least marketable out of the new fighters but got the most because he was relevant to the story and that is the the story of this merchandising of DBS in a nutshell, they're scared to branch away and get out their comfort zones, plenty of characters that could have been proven to be merchandise gold mines have been given no thought, I mean Hit alone could and would have been gold dust for them. But instead they want to use the good faith of DBS to shift they're shitty Z and GT stuff and it is pretty disgusting as once characters have no on screen relevance anymore they cannot be marketed again. In 3 years they can't suddenly be like oh shit let's market Anirazza now...

SSG Goku made an anime comeback but the merch people treated it as non-existent and we're like oh here have a UDM or candy release, despite SSG (along with Jiren) voted to come back as part of UDM re-release later... they did nothing with it. Why? Cuz they don't want to go out their comfort zone, god forbid they actually put some effort it y'know.

So what have we learned?

SSGSS was immensely popular, it was the main merchandising (like lunch boxes, pencils etc) visual for 4 arcs in a row, so many and all sorts of figure releases and SSGSS stuff would hardly drop in price and in fact in some cases go up.

Jiren merch had a slow start as expected as he basically did nothing until the special and after that he's been going pretty well, voted in the UDM re-release, getting even a re-released premium bandai set (along with Goku and Zen-Oh), this never happened with the Trunks arc sets btw that tells you what you need to know!

Conclusion and final thoughts

Poor planning, laziness and the refusal to get out their comfort zones make DBS merch in general pretty shambolic to be honest, sure thing picked up in 2017 and 2018 looked amazing only to find out it was cuz they show was ending... kinda funny that they finally get off their arse and do something when the show is ending and knowing they had to capitalise on UI Goku. Looks like the boat has sailed on all the other characters they missed.

The show wasn't made "to sell toys" it is about as far from the truth as possible, as I hope you all can now understand. If so SSG Goku would've been marketed, SSG Vegeta would've been a thing, UI Goku should have been the main visual for main merchandising not SSGSS Goku again and UI. Other Saiyans would have got SSGSS given's it immeasurable popularity, the U6 Saiyans and Kale in particular should have been all over the shop instead of f**king Broly.

If they show comes back I hope they plan this shit properly like they did UI Goku, I mean the retellings should have gven them a leg up but instead we've been playing catch up because of a woeful 2016...

Thank you for sharing this information and I hope that others see this and truly understand that Super is not made just for the toys.

[BlueBasilisk]

Let's see what is going on over at main Bandai meanwhile well their UDM line is chugging along same old same use of a few characters, but in a massive twist the VS gashapon line continued... oh. my god... going back to the BoG arc, Goku vs Beerus maybe Vegeta and Whis too or something... oh Broly and SS4 Gogeta... but it wasn't until vol 5 when it was just to dumb to comprehend... U.S arc set... Base Goku vs #17 cool and SSGSS Vegeta vs.... Kale... nope SS3 Broly LMAO what the f**ck is wrong with them? Kale f**cking exists she is right there! What is the point of her if they aren't gonna do anything with her? How does SS3 Broly make any sense here?

This right here is the most telling. Fucking Broly has more Super-branded merchandise than most Super characters and ToP merchandise despite not even being in the damn show at all! And it's not just this! The Dragon Ball Super Vs. gashapon set has one of the few Jiren figures in it...and the rest are all DBZ. Buu Saga Super Saiyan Goku doing the Spirit Bomb, Gogeta, Janemba, and there's an SSB Kaioken Goku doing the Spirit Bomb but it's just a repaint of the other SS Goku down to the same damn pose. Or look at the new Adverge set that has DBS 17, Jiren, and UI Goku in it. Who rounds out that set? Gogeta and Janemba again!

I seriously wonder if Goku and Vegeta switching back to their normal gear after the Universe 6 arc wasn't at the request of Bandai so they could continue hocking Z merchandise under the Super label while being slightly less blatant about it.

[GodVegetto91]

Interesting.. I guess i’ve learned something new then. Thanks Baggie! For the wonderful info. It seems Super isn’t as obsessed with making money through merchandising as we all previously thought. Introducing nearly 80 characters just to do nothing with it! How stupid are they? Yeah at this point i have lost all respect for them, even from a marketing standpoint. They are literally incomprehensible. I wonder what their deal is? Maybe they really are pussy’s who are too affraid to get out of their comfort zone. Even though any character sold equals more money made.

[Marlowe89]

Although I do think that there might be merchandising considerations for the frequency of specific, popular forms (Super Saiyan Blue Goku in particular) I'd agree that the show as a whole isn't attempting to revolve around it. I think that Super's detractors actually get too caught up on the merchandising aspect of the show rather than its more pressing issues such as dialogue cohesion and how episodic-style writing can detract from the impact of certain major scenes and events.

Great post as always, though. It's nice to have members here who know their stuff in regards to this subject matter, if only for the sake of dispelling some heavy misconceptions.

[Baggie_Saiyan]

Although I do think that there might be merchandising considerations for the frequency of specific, popular forms (Super Saiyan Blue Goku in particular) I'd agree that the show as a whole isn't attempting to revolve around it. I think that Super's detractors actually get too caught up on the merchandising aspect of the show rather than its more pressing issues such as dialogue cohesion and how episodic-style writing can detract from the impact of certain major scenes and events.

Great post as always, though. It's nice to have members here who know their stuff in regards to this subject matter, if only for the sake of dispelling some heavy misconceptions.

That's one thing I would agree with. But I think KK allowed Toei to basically over-use base SSGSS.
It seems that people are bored of SS and the yellow-ness for years plus blonde isn't that "exotic" so when blue came along I think people just ate it up and it seemed cooler, I mean the final arc had Goku's new form but SSGSS was still main visual for the arc and was the previous 3 before then too.

[Super Sayian Prime]

The shambles that was the show's production and the lack of a proper manga series probably made it difficult to co-ordinate product that would require lead time.

Dragon Ball Super was still made to sell merchandise, though. :p

[HeroR]

Preface: I think this deserves it's own topic and I think people over on the merch thread are fed up of me ranting all the time, so one big rant to end them all!

Question: How can a show be marketed so much and at the same time barely be marketed?

Answer:

To begin to answer this question we have to go all the way back to 2015. A new DBZ movie came out spring of the year, DB Kai was on air set to end in the summer. DB was in a bit of a bloom and then DBS is announced but beyond that basically the first 6 months of it's airing aka the rest of 2015 will be retelling movies and one of which just came out during the same here that they already marketed and merched. So with DBS 2015 was a really awkward year on how to merchandise it, because essentially they had to make BoG relevant again only for them to make it irrelevant again if that makes sense, so BoG basically got the light end of the candle here, while Bandai were releasing a lot of "smaller" merch basic stuff kids can pick up with loose change there wasn't anything major for BoG until the end of 2015 when the current main prize figure line, Chouzoushu, decided to adopt DBS and started off with a SSG Goku before moving on to Resurrection "F" with a Beerus and BAse Vegeta in "F" outfit and then a base Goku in F gi and then a Champa*.

Aside from that Resurrection "F" pretty much was the front and centre of early DBS merchandising as expected, towards the end of 2015 the SCultures 5 joint winners, KOZO and Nakazawa sculpted a SPECIAL release of SSGSS Goku vs Golden Freeza respectively under the DBS brand name. 2015 was only home to a Goku vs Freeza Ichiban Kuji release but shared both the DBS and Z branding. So thus 2015 came to and end and to be honest it was just what one would expect, ResF would still get the majority of the merchandising and marketing and that is exactly what happened... then 2016 happened and it was a disaster.

So 2016... the missed year. So the year started off with Banpresto releasing more volumes of their two on going regular prize figure lines the previously mentioned Chouzoushu and the Master Stars Piece line and both of these ended in March... Just as soon as the U6 was heating up, the Chouzoushu ended with that Goku and Champa volume and the MSP line with base Gotenks and we didn't get a new main prize figure line until January 2017.... 9 months without a main prize figure line. Instead Banpresto focused on getting their Z dramatic showcase and Resolution of Soldiers line's out. However the yearly SCultures line was completely under the DBS brand which was a yay............only to find out that of the 6 figures there would only be 3 characters (2 18's, 2 SS2 Goku's and 2 SS3 Goku's) The Goku's had gi with Kanji on and came out around the Trunks arc so they were DBS related then. Also during the summer they released these special Genki Dama Base and SS Goku's under the DBS brand despite it obviously being Z. Sensing a pattern?

Main Bandai also didn't know what they heck they were doing. Their current monthly UDM mini keychain gashapon was moving as per usual but despite under the DBS branding they would only had like a couple DBS related characters per set and a lot of the time was the same old same. They started a new gashapon line "Scene Selection" as you can see more NON DBS related characters taking up stupid space, a stoned Krillin that is so f**cking lazy they didn't want to colour another figure.This is just the tip. Worse the thing was this gashapon line ended here... and another didn't get picked up until the end of the Trunks arc when they released the "VS" gashpon set in December....

Even Banpresto's WCF line didn't get to the U6 stuff until MARCH 2017!

2016 was f**king shambolic. But it doesn't end there 2016 had a MAJOR release in the brand new Ichiban Kuji SUPER MASTER STARS PIECE THE SON GOKU and it was under specific DBS branding.... oh my god so exciting. I wonder what it could be, SSGSS KK Goku? Oh wait no it's Namek Goku from Z... The DBS logo is there front and centre.... the add more salt in the wounds... they released the same thing a few months later with 2 additional colourings...

So to summarise, in show DBS had two new materiel arcs in the U6 arc and Trunks arc... both of which were barely scratched upon in terms of merchandising... synergizing with the show SHOULD have been number one priority, like they're doing with UI Goku- which is no coincidence that it happens as the show is f**king ending the month it makes it debut! In terms of non figure merchandising like lunch boxes etc this didn't happen for the Trunks arc until near the end of the damn arc... lord give me strength.

So 2017, the decent year. So with the shambolic 2016 over and with the prospect of a the U.S arc looming over.... they have to play catch up and so 9 months after their main Prize lines ended they started the a new one, their DXF release starting with Future Trunks in January and thus having to skip over the U6 arc. After vol 1 each DXF release would have 2 figures per set which was great... only to find out it would re-use a mould from the previous set's new figure.... thus making it even longer to get new characters to be released... On top of that the releases aren't great suffer primarily from mediocre paintjobs.

SSGSSKK did get a one off release.... only to find the aura came separate and was limited to about 1 aura released per 6 of the figure... thus making the release essentially worthless.

March the WCF's finally moved onto releasing new material stuff starting with the U6 arc and then copy Vegeta a few months later and then Trunks arc more months later and then baseball episodes and ending at some of the ToP fighters in Sept before the main WCF line came to f**cking end... with Jiren and Kale (the only substantial release for her btw) being the only new fighters they released....

Let's see what is going on over at main Bandai meanwhile well their UDM line is chugging along same old same use of a few characters, but in a massive twist the VS gashapon line continued... oh. my god... going back to the BoG arc, Goku vs Beerus maybe Vegeta and Whis too or something... oh Broly and SS4 Gogeta... but it wasn't until vol 5 when it was just to dumb to comprehend... U.S arc set... Base Goku vs #17 cool and SSGSS Vegeta vs.... Kale... nope SS3 Broly LMAO what the f**ck is wrong with them? Kale f**cking exists she is right there! What is the point of her if they aren't gonna do anything with her? How does SS3 Broly make any sense here?

After the SUPER MASTER STARS PIECE THE SON GOKU it only made sense to do a THE VEGETA. Unlike Goku we can at least say Okay this can be DBS related as Vegeta has used SS in Cell arc attire.

So before we wrap up 2017 there were two more interesting things here, Son Goku got his own Prize Figure line the DBS Son Goku FES line... sculpted by legendary sculptor Nakazawa... however if one thought this was gonna stop Goku bleeding into other line...yeah no. Despite the line starting off with SSGSS Goku it went on to have SS Namek Goku, Saiyan arc Base Goku, Kid Goku, SS3 Buu arc Goku... before finally getting back to DBS with Goku Black only for it to then go SS4 Goku and Gogeta... all under the nice heathly brand name of DBS, feels good man.

It is beginning to feel a lot like identity fraud at this point.

However 2017 isn't over yet, Banpresto brought back regular Ichiban Kuji and their sheer laziness in full force, granted the IBK's were off a higher quality than previous regular IBK's but their laziness is there for all to see.

ToP power regular merchandising didn't start like the Trunks arc until near the end of the year... bit with no UI Goku visit just regular SSGSS... UI Goku wouldn't have happened to late into the arc if they simply wanted to create it for "merchandising reasons". Sure it is getting quite a bit March 2018 and beyond but it has too as the show is freaking ending.

Now on to 2018, schedules up to September and no indication of Vegeta's new form, so we're 9 months and counting for that. Nothing to imply we'll see anymore new ToP fighters*, still a plethora of SSGSS merch and SSR Black. After UI hype in early 2018, DBS and DB in general is slowly now petering out as we head to the end of the year.

*Jiren the only fighter with any sort of merchandising I could call significant from promo art, to mini figures to premium releases. Beyond him Kale/Caulifla got a couple stickers and mini figure, same for Kafla and Bergamo and mouse GoD got a mini keychain and that was it. That is it for the new characters. So much so for "merchandising the arc". I am sure many would agree Jiren is the least marketable out of the new fighters but got the most because he was relevant to the story and that is the the story of this merchandising of DBS in a nutshell, they're scared to branch away and get out their comfort zones, plenty of characters that could have been proven to be merchandise gold mines have been given no thought, I mean Hit alone could and would have been gold dust for them. But instead they want to use the good faith of DBS to shift they're shitty Z and GT stuff and it is pretty disgusting as once characters have no on screen relevance anymore they cannot be marketed again. In 3 years they can't suddenly be like oh shit let's market Anirazza now...

SSG Goku made an anime comeback but the merch people treated it as non-existent and we're like oh here have a UDM or candy release, despite SSG (along with Jiren) voted to come back as part of UDM re-release later... they did nothing with it. Why? Cuz they don't want to go out their comfort zone, god forbid they actually put some effort it y'know.

So what have we learned?

SSGSS was immensely popular, it was the main merchandising (like lunch boxes, pencils etc) visual for 4 arcs in a row, so many and all sorts of figure releases and SSGSS stuff would hardly drop in price and in fact in some cases go up.

Jiren merch had a slow start as expected as he basically did nothing until the special and after that he's been going pretty well, voted in the UDM re-release, getting even a re-released premium bandai set (along with Goku and Zen-Oh), this never happened with the Trunks arc sets btw that tells you what you need to know!

Conclusion and final thoughts:

Poor planning, laziness and the refusal to get out their comfort zones make DBS merch in general pretty shambolic to be honest, sure thing picked up in 2017 and 2018 looked amazing only to find out it was cuz they show was ending... kinda funny that they finally get off their arse and do something when the show is ending and knowing they had to capitalise on UI Goku. Looks like the boat has sailed on all the other characters they missed.

The show wasn't made "to sell toys" it is about as far from the truth as possible, as I hope you all can now understand. If so SSG Goku would've been marketed, SSG Vegeta would've been a thing, UI Goku should have been the main visual for main merchandising not SSGSS Goku again. Other Saiyans would have got SSGSS given it's immeasurable popularity, the U6 Saiyans and Kale in particular should have been all over the shop instead of f**king Broly.

If they show comes back I hope they plan this shit properly like they did UI Goku, I mean the retellings should have gven them a leg up but instead we've been playing catch up because of a woeful 2016...

Copied and pasted for future, Super is all marketing.

[Baggie_Saiyan]

The shambles that was the show's production and the lack of a proper manga series probably made it difficult to co-ordinate product that would require lead time.

Dragon Ball Super was still made to sell merchandise, though. :p

Like I said they had half a year leg up thanks to the retellings, it literally didn't affect them in 2015 they just added DBS brand on to any BoG and RF Merch. The SSG that came out and the end of 2015 was originally under the Z brand but then changed to DBS when it came out.

There's no excuse they're just lazy.

[Logania]

Super was never focused on it, although I kinda wish it was honestly so there would be more figures and things lol

I already got enough Black and Super Cyan Blue Goku stuff. I need more Hit and Toppo

Now for the games however, Super is gonna ride this series and it's new characters as releases for years to come.

[Lord Beerus]

Huh. So the new content of Dragon Ball Super was either barely advertised in terms of merchandise or not merchandised at all. That's very odd. You think with all the new characters and forms Super has created Bandai would have field day with it, but they just fell back on DBZ again. Makes you wonder how much of an effect Super had on the spike in profit for Bandai from 2015 and onward in the merchandise selling capacity.

[Baggie_Saiyan]

Huh. So the new content of Dragon Ball Super was either barely advertised in terms of merchandise or not merchandised at all. That's very odd. You think with all the new characters and forms Super has created Bandai would have field day with it, but they just fell back on DBZ again. Makes you wonder how much of an effect Super had on the spike in profit for Bandai from 2015 and onward in the merchandise selling capacity.

It is not odd it is just laziness. DBS' strong brand name gave them another brand to play around with but unfortunately all they were concerned with was that the name sold and so they used the DBS brand to shift extra Z/GT/Heroes stuff. They have separate Z branded stuff and yet Z stuff bleeds into DBS all the f**king time, it is ridiculous. It is the same with Goku gets his own DBS line of prize figures yet bleeds into other lines all the time!

Vegeta's new form,we have 3 months of the year left for them to do something with it, but regular SSGSS Vegeta? Yup he is still being marketed for some reason. Once something sells they don't care that is it they refuse to extend themselves. Kale was made perfect for them a "canon" Broly if you will but they did nothing with her I am still amazed about that.

But the DBS brand is just too strong at the moment, as recent as December this premium Bandai set sold out it's first shipment and due to popular demand had a second shipment this rarely happens and that sold out too! Each set retailed for ~6400 yen, so they made quite a bit of bank from that set. This Goku Black came out in Jan and is already of high market value for a prize figure that has just come out, last week's Grandista Goku Black, was #1 on Amazon JP the day it came out, and is already going up and has already taken over the Z branded Majin Vegeta MV which came out in December! Perhaps I have just answered my own question here as to why they bleed Z stuff into DBS...

The Ultra Instinct Ichiban Kuji begins Saturday they are gonna make bank on that, 2.08% of getting UI Goku? I can see folks spending tickets on tickets trying to get it.

[Lord Beerus]

Huh. So the new content of Dragon Ball Super was either barely advertised in terms of merchandise or not merchandised at all. That's very odd. You think with all the new characters and forms Super has created Bandai would have field day with it, but they just fell back on DBZ again. Makes you wonder how much of an effect Super had on the spike in profit for Bandai from 2015 and onward in the merchandise selling capacity.

It is not odd it is just laziness. DBS' strong brand name gave them another brand to play around with but unfortunately all they were concerned with was that the name sold and so they used the DBS brand to shift extra Z/GT/Heroes stuff. They have separate Z branded stuff and yet Z stuff bleeds into DBS all the f**king time, it is ridiculous. It is the same with Goku gets his own DBS line of prize figures yet bleeds into other lines all the time!

Vegeta's new form,we have 3 months of the year left for them to do something with it, but regular SSGSS Vegeta? Yup he is still being marketed for some reason. Once something sells they don't care that is it they refuse to extend themselves. Kale was made perfect for them a "canon" Broly if you will but they did nothing with her I am still amazed about that.

But the DBS brand is just too strong at the moment, as recent as December this premium Bandai set sold out it's first shipment and due to popular demand had a second shipment this rarely happens and that sold out too! Each set retailed for ~6400 yen, so they made quite a bit of bank from that set. This Goku Black came out in Jan and is already of high market value for a prize figure that has just come out, last week's Grandista Goku Black, was #1 on Amazon JP the day it came out, and is already going up and has already taken over the Z branded Majin Vegeta MV which came out in December! Perhaps I have just answered my own question here as to why they bleed Z stuff into DBS...

The Ultra Instinct Ichiban Kuji begins Saturday they are gonna make bank on that, 2.08% of getting UI Goku? I can see folks spending tickets on tickets trying to get it.

Okay. So the brand of Dragon Ball Super was so strong that they basically used that to pimp out more of the same old DB/Z/GT/Heroes merch.

[majinwarman]

Huh. So the new content of Dragon Ball Super was either barely advertised in terms of merchandise or not merchandised at all. That's very odd. You think with all the new characters and forms Super has created Bandai would have field day with it, but they just fell back on DBZ again. Makes you wonder how much of an effect Super had on the spike in profit for Bandai from 2015 and onward in the merchandise selling capacity.

It is not odd it is just laziness. DBS' strong brand name gave them another brand to play around with but unfortunately all they were concerned with was that the name sold and so they used the DBS brand to shift extra Z/GT/Heroes stuff. They have separate Z branded stuff and yet Z stuff bleeds into DBS all the f**king time, it is ridiculous. It is the same with Goku gets his own DBS line of prize figures yet bleeds into other lines all the time!

Vegeta's new form,we have 3 months of the year left for them to do something with it, but regular SSGSS Vegeta? Yup he is still being marketed for some reason. Once something sells they don't care that is it they refuse to extend themselves. Kale was made perfect for them a "canon" Broly if you will but they did nothing with her I am still amazed about that.

But the DBS brand is just too strong at the moment, as recent as December this premium Bandai set sold out it's first shipment and due to popular demand had a second shipment this rarely happens and that sold out too! Each set retailed for ~6400 yen, so they made quite a bit of bank from that set. This Goku Black came out in Jan and is already of high market value for a prize figure that has just come out, last week's Grandista Goku Black, was #1 on Amazon JP the day it came out, and is already going up and has already taken over the Z branded Majin Vegeta MV which came out in December! Perhaps I have just answered my own question here as to why they bleed Z stuff into DBS...

The Ultra Instinct Ichiban Kuji begins Saturday they are gonna make bank on that, 2.08% of getting UI Goku? I can see folks spending tickets on tickets trying to get it.

Okay. So the brand of Dragon Ball Super was so strong that they basically used that to pimp out more of the same old DB/Z/GT/Heroes merch.

That just shows the lack of trust that they selling GT or Heroes merchandise without using the name Dragon Ball Super.

[Baggie_Saiyan]

Huh. So the new content of Dragon Ball Super was either barely advertised in terms of merchandise or not merchandised at all. That's very odd. You think with all the new characters and forms Super has created Bandai would have field day with it, but they just fell back on DBZ again. Makes you wonder how much of an effect Super had on the spike in profit for Bandai from 2015 and onward in the merchandise selling capacity.

It is not odd it is just laziness. DBS' strong brand name gave them another brand to play around with but unfortunately all they were concerned with was that the name sold and so they used the DBS brand to shift extra Z/GT/Heroes stuff. They have separate Z branded stuff and yet Z stuff bleeds into DBS all the f**king time, it is ridiculous. It is the same with Goku gets his own DBS line of prize figures yet bleeds into other lines all the time!

Vegeta's new form,we have 3 months of the year left for them to do something with it, but regular SSGSS Vegeta? Yup he is still being marketed for some reason. Once something sells they don't care that is it they refuse to extend themselves. Kale was made perfect for them a "canon" Broly if you will but they did nothing with her I am still amazed about that.

But the DBS brand is just too strong at the moment, as recent as December this premium Bandai set sold out it's first shipment and due to popular demand had a second shipment this rarely happens and that sold out too! Each set retailed for ~6400 yen, so they made quite a bit of bank from that set. This Goku Black came out in Jan and is already of high market value for a prize figure that has just come out, last week's Grandista Goku Black, was #1 on Amazon JP the day it came out, and is already going up and has already taken over the Z branded Majin Vegeta MV which came out in December! Perhaps I have just answered my own question here as to why they bleed Z stuff into DBS...

The Ultra Instinct Ichiban Kuji begins Saturday they are gonna make bank on that, 2.08% of getting UI Goku? I can see folks spending tickets on tickets trying to get it.

Okay. So the brand of Dragon Ball Super was so strong that they basically used that to pimp out more of the same old DB/Z/GT/Heroes merch.

I could have just summed it up like that, instead of going on a tangent but yeah that's exactly what I was getting at lol.

[Lord Beerus]

It is not odd it is just laziness. DBS' strong brand name gave them another brand to play around with but unfortunately all they were concerned with was that the name sold and so they used the DBS brand to shift extra Z/GT/Heroes stuff. They have separate Z branded stuff and yet Z stuff bleeds into DBS all the f**king time, it is ridiculous. It is the same with Goku gets his own DBS line of prize figures yet bleeds into other lines all the time!

Vegeta's new form,we have 3 months of the year left for them to do something with it, but regular SSGSS Vegeta? Yup he is still being marketed for some reason. Once something sells they don't care that is it they refuse to extend themselves. Kale was made perfect for them a "canon" Broly if you will but they did nothing with her I am still amazed about that.

But the DBS brand is just too strong at the moment, as recent as December this premium Bandai set sold out it's first shipment and due to popular demand had a second shipment this rarely happens and that sold out too! Each set retailed for ~6400 yen, so they made quite a bit of bank from that set. This Goku Black came out in Jan and is already of high market value for a prize figure that has just come out, last week's Grandista Goku Black, was #1 on Amazon JP the day it came out, and is already going up and has already taken over the Z branded Majin Vegeta MV which came out in December! Perhaps I have just answered my own question here as to why they bleed Z stuff into DBS...

The Ultra Instinct Ichiban Kuji begins Saturday they are gonna make bank on that, 2.08% of getting UI Goku? I can see folks spending tickets on tickets trying to get it.

Okay. So the brand of Dragon Ball Super was so strong that they basically used that to pimp out more of the same old DB/Z/GT/Heroes merch.

That just shows the lack of trust that they selling GT or Heroes merchandise without using the name Dragon Ball Super.

On the flipside, this shows how valuable Dragon Ball Super is as a brand name and makes it even more clear that Super is very likely to return to TV sooner than later.

[majinwarman]

Okay. So the brand of Dragon Ball Super was so strong that they basically used that to pimp out more of the same old DB/Z/GT/Heroes merch.

That just shows the lack of trust that they selling GT or Heroes merchandise without using the name Dragon Ball Super.

On the flipside, this shows how valuable Dragon Ball Super is as a brand name and makes it even more clear that Super is very likely to return to TV sooner than later.

Maybe you can see it that way but I just don't know if I can believe it though.

[Baggie_Saiyan]

On the flipside, this shows how valuable Dragon Ball Super is as a brand name and makes it even more clear that Super is very likely to return to TV sooner than later.

Despite getting a huge shake up the new movie is still under the DBS brand! Just shows how valuable it is. Like I said it has been overtaking Z lately in Japan

Anyway something else I have interestingly noticed in SS3 merch doesn't seem to do too well, a lot of it sits around and available pretty cheaply. I think there might be a connection between that and it's lack of appearance in DBS plus saves animators time too. Conversely like I mentioned elsewhere SS4 only seems popular with Gogeta (no coincidence because of the red hair) meanwhile any regular SS4 Goku and Vegeta have generally been aimed at higher higher end of collectors, the DBS FES line will have an SS4 Goku (cuz logic) out in May and re-released in July (again laziness) since that is a regular prize figure I am curious to see how that actually does.

SS2 and SSG get the short end of the stick they're hardly marketed and cannot attribute them to not doing well as they're never given the chance (recently they been getting smaller stuff so there is that I suppose).