The New Animal Crossing Ichiban Kuji Merch Finally Came Out!

[StarlitGlitch]

This Ichiban Kuji was pushed back twice because of COVID-19 (it was supposed to come out March 21st but it ended up being last Saturday) but it's here!

If you haven't heard of it before Ichiban Kuji, by Bandai Spirits, sells sets of merchandise in Japan for big franchises like popular anime and video games. Instead of directly buying what you want you purchase a raffle ticket and get something at random with some items being rarer.

I ended up buying two tickets and got two towels from it, then purchased the rug second-hand. They sold out almost immediately in my town (the first store I checked sold out before the day it officially comes out not too long after they finished setting it up, so I think a scalper got to it) so the prices might get pretty high.

The items in this set are pretty cute. If you’re interested, I made a video talking about different ways of buying Ichiban Kuji, even if you’re not in Japan. I also go over in detail what Ichiban Kuji is and how the system works including footage of me in the store. It can be a bit confusing so I hope that it helps!

If you still have any questions you can feel free to ask me!

 

[Theoneandonlymegan]

Ooh those are really cool looking

 

[Piggleton]

Japan seriously has the best merch and fun ways to get it too. If I actually lived in japan, would go broke real quick between ichiban kugi and gachapons

 

[Sweetley]

Love the Timmy and Tommy plushies, the blanket in the second photo is also very cute. Wish merchandise like this would be available in my country, but we never get anything cool here...

 

[Katgamer]

This is so cute! I wanna try this

 

[Xara]

oh those look so cute!! i love the rug :0

 

[Skandranon]

those are some cute plushies

 

[StarlitGlitch]

The plushies are actually a part of a tissue box holder!! On the official page for the set you can see better pictures of all of the items. They're the highest rank item this time.

 

[Mikaiah]

wtf that's adorbs!! how do i get any of this stuff stateside

 

[StarlitGlitch]

wtf that's adorbs!! how do i get any of this stuff stateside

Well, if you're interested in the YouTube video I embedded in my original post I go over everything on how to buy the items and suggest some sites.

Basically there are non-Japanese sites that sell Ichiban Kuji directly to you and then Japanese sites that you can try with a shopping service. However, most stores sold out within mere hours (whereas they normally go on for about a week) so it seems it might be fairly competitive. I haven't seen much available from non-Japanese sites so you might need to go with a Japanese site and a shopping service...

You can ask me any questions you have here too.

 

[Hypno KK]

The water bottle is so great, I wish I could buy it somewhere!

Has this brand done AC merch before or will they do it again in the future? And is there any good AC merch coming out soon? I'm so bad at keeping track of merch.

Do you live in Japan, by the way? I'm really curious about the whole process of this raffle and how it sounds like there are local/town limits?

 

[StarlitGlitch]

The water bottle is so great, I wish I could buy it somewhere!

Has this brand done AC merch before or will they do it again in the future? And is there any good AC merch coming out soon? I'm so bad at keeping track of merch.

Do you live in Japan, by the way? I'm really curious about the whole process of this raffle and how it sounds like there are local/town limits?

This is the third Animal Crossing Ichiban Kuji! The first one came out in 2018 and the second one came out last year. When the first one came out I was in America and just bought one plate off of a vendor online, but for the second one I was in Japan and bought a bunch. I might buy the pillows from the first one eventually though, I'm always going back and forth. So it seems like it might become a yearly March release (since this one was pushed back because of COVID-19) but it's not guaranteed. Would make sense though since how popular it is.

Nintendo Tokyo also has some pretty good merch! Here's what I bought for Christmas last year. I might buy the oven mitt sometime...
Also it might be hard to tell so on the bottom left is a bath mat and to the right of it is a place mat. There's also been random other items that have come out overt time.

Yes, I do! There's more too it but the basic concept is that you purchase tickets for the chance to draw one of the items. It's based off of the rank of the item with rarer items being fewer. Some merch has multiple designs and the cashier will let you pick which one you want. Stores decide individually by location (many of them are franchises) if they want to participate in each Ichiban Kuji or not. For more popular franchises there will normally be more stores that take part. In the past I just tried random Seven-Elevens but it was a pain. Now I know that you can just use the official site to find all stores that are selling them! And each store receives the same amount of items.

 

[meo]

It's so adorable, I want it all. <3