I know I shouldn’t be surprised, but… you can buy gashapon machines?!
For no ‘good citizen of the earth’ reason, I’m a little obsessed with gashapon machines.
What is a gashapon machines? My friend, you know what a gashapon machine is – but you might not know they’re called gashapon machines.
If you’ve ever bought a toy in a capsule from a little vending machine, that’s a form of gashapon machine. In the west, they’re better known as gumball machines, because that’s how the whole thing started: In America, in the 1880s.
They were later adapted for capsule toys (the capsules helping ensure a smooth flow through the machine’s workings), and exported to Japan after World War 2.
That’s when the machines really took off, under the term カプセルトイ, which reads in English as kapuseru toi – an Kataka-based translation into Japanese of the English phrase ‘capsule toy’.
Okay, kapuseru toi. So… why are they called Gashapon machines?
It’s onomatopoeia! That is, it’s a word that imitates a sound, like ‘crunch’ or ‘bang’ or ‘achoo’.
To the ears of the Japanese, or at least those who coined (pardon the pun) the phrase, ‘gasha’ or ‘gacha’ represents the sound of the toy capsule being dispensed from the machine, the clunk and the turning of the crank, while ‘pon’ represents the sound of the capsule dropping into the collection tray.
Did you know animals ‘sound different’ in Japan? Dogs say wan-wan, frogs say kero-kero, and so on!) This is true for most countries, of course.
I love it all so much, but I especially love the toys, for ‘I never really grew up’ reasons.
Incidentally, Gashapon is trademarked by Bandai, who also make the machine pictured above and linked below – and they have stores all around the world, filled with rows upon rows of machines.
Bandai has been selling Gashapon toys since 1977, and the most recent stats I could find claim they’d sold 3.71 billion of them by 2021.
Bandai’s biggest rival in toys and in gashapon machines is Tomy, which uses the trademark Gacha.
If you’ve gotta have one, as I feel I probably do, check it out below.
It’s up to you to fill it, of course, but it’s not hard to find toys that’ll fit in the capsules!
🔔 The above is an affiliate link. If you buy through this link, we’ll make a truly tiny commission and will super appreciate your contribution to making Realcool a profitable thing (which, at the time of publishing, it ain’t and might never be).
You’ll even find them in Nintendo stores in Japan, selling keyrings inspired by their iconic games controllers over the years.
(Disclosure: I ended up buying the full set on eBay and err I will never financially recover.)
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