3 Reasons to Start an Anime Box

We recently identified the most-searched terms on Cratejoy and discovered “anime” is one of the biggest areas of demand.

If you’re an anime buff, starting an anime subscription box is a great way to do what you love and engage with a passionate, like-minded community – all while making extra income on the side. We’ll quickly run through a few reasons why you should start an anime-themed subscription box.

1. An Emerging Demographic

Stereotypes are hard to shake. Anime and all things we generally label as “geeky” are overwhelmingly associated with men – but that’s a mindset we all should challenge. This becomes especially important if you’re in the business of anime-related merchandise.

Forbes found that as of 2014, half of all anime convention attendees in North America are women. But what does that mean for your budding anime subscription box?

With a little sleuthing on our blog, you may find that a majority of Cratejoy subscribers are women: 82.3%, to be exact. Starting a subscription box not only allows you to appeal to this emerging demographic of anime lovers (who are specifically searching for your would-be box, by the way), but you also enjoy all of the customer retention benefits that a subscription-based business model brings.

2. A Dedicated, Tight-Knit Fanbase

A fandom is driven and connected by the community that surrounds it – and anime is a big one. If you’re asking yourself, “Would people really be willing to pay for my subscription box?”, check out this Reddit thread.

This isn’t meant to be an exhaustive or all-encompassing list of anime lovers, but Reddit is a good representation of the community around it. From the thread, you can see that people are spending quite a bit of money (oftentimes hundreds of dollars a month) on anime they feel particularly close to. But as an anime lover, you probably already knew that.

With a subscription box, the business model itself taps into the feeling of community more than anything else. That’s why oftentimes our sellers opt for calling their product a “club,” rather than “subscription”: to foster that sense of community. For this specific industry, you could create a Facebook group or another social platform for your subscribers to mingle and interact. This will help tie your product to a sense of belonging and help prevent churn!

3. Touch of the Curator

But why a subscription box? Why not just buy individual products on Amazon?

Curation. Curating a collection of products is something only provided by the human touch. Sure, you can display a section that says “customers also enjoyed…” but it’s not the same. The word “curation” evokes a sense of prestige in itself. It almost feels like the beauty and elegance of “handmade” or “genuine leather” in the description. Think of who you could be. A “box of anime merchandise”? Or, rather, “a handpicked curation of one-of-a-kind anime treasures”?

And that’s ultimately what a subscription box gives you. In an industry that’s so driven by passion, you get to put your passion into it. Subscribers aren’t buying something that was plopped off a machine in a factory by a profit-hungry corporation, but rather from you – someone who took the time and effort to curate a set of treasures, and that’s what makes subscription boxes successful and special.