Broccoli To Close Business in USA

by dtshyk
Nov 20, 2008 2:50 AM | 56 Comments

According to the press release, an anime character goods retailer Broccoli International USA will be dissolved on December 31st, 2008. Broccoli USA is a subsidiary company of Broccoli (Japan) ("Di Gi Charat", "Galaxy Angel", "Aquarian Age") and has been running "Anime Gamers" stores in US since 2002. In these years, the sales and profits of Anime Gamers steeply decreased due to the intensive competition with other anime goods shops. As a result of the dissolution of Broccoli USA, all the Japanese retailers specialized in the anime goods will disappear from US.

Source: Broccoli press release (pdf file)
Source: Anime!Anime!

20 of 56 Comments Recent Comments

Oh, that's too bad. They had really nice printing. Their paper was amazing quality. :[

Dec 18, 2008 6:44 AM by grendelity

I had no idea theres anime specialty stores in the states... can someone compile the big "chain" stores that are in the USA? Because all i know of is a small mom and pop organization in vegas, and Anime Jungle in LA.

EDIT: i knew i heard Broccoli from somewhere...
They're the people that runs the infamous Gamers store in Japan.
http://shop.broccoli.co.jp/index.php

If i only knew they even had a US branch... damn i guess its too late.

Dec 14, 2008 9:44 PM by Ranivus

Another update:
Deux Press announced on December 10 that it will be picking up the title Cigarette Kisses by Nase Yamato. It was supposed to have been published by Boysenberry Press, the yaoi imprint of Broccoli books. Fans can expect to see it sometime in the latter half of 2009.

Deux Press News Article, Dec. 10, 2008

Dec 14, 2008 3:02 PM by animedreamer

Here's an update to the story:

Broccoli International USA, the U.S. branch of Broccoli International, includes the manga imprints Broccoli Books and Boysenberry, a planned line of yaoi manga. President Kaname Tezuka said, "The corporate group in Japan [Broccoli Co. Ltd.....] decided that it would be best to concentrate their efforts in the Japanese market for the time being."

Five full-time staffers as well as a number of part-time employees and freelancers are affected by the closure. "We have stopped printing all books in progress, and will not be releasing any new titles for the rest of the year per our licensing agreements," Shizuki Yamashita, director of operations and managing editor for Broccoli International U.S., said. Fourteen series, including Kamui, Galaxy Angel II, and Koi Cupid, are still unfinished. "One title is currently in the process of being picked up by a U.S. publisher, but we haven't been contacted [about] other titles yet."

Another manga publisher commented that the quality of Broccoli's products was its strong suit. "...they had a great rapport with fandom....Broccoli was a company that people loved." The current economy aside, he said Broccoli Books' biggest limitation was being subsidiary of Broccoli Co., Ltd, noting that they had few licenses, mostly limited to their parent company, and that "Broccoli Japan is a retailer first and foremost."

Broccoli Books launched in 2004 with a line of mostly shojo manga titles such as Juvenile Orion. They also published "multi-media properties", such as Disgaea and Murder Princess, targeted to older teens and young adults. They published about 10 books a year, in addition to importing fan merchandise produced by Broccoli Japan. In 2007, the company added Boysenberry Books, a yaoi line of books that included such titles as Delivery Cupid and Pet on Duty.

Broccoli Books production blog, Nov. 20, 2008
Publishers Weekly, Nov 21, 2008
PW Comics Week, Nov 25, 2008

Nov 30, 2008 5:00 PM by animedreamer

JLS said:
I wanted to pick up Pandora Hearts manga from them. Hopefully YenPress or Del Rey decides to go for it. Sad news indeed. My condolences to those who will lose their jobs.

Yes, all three people they actually employed at the US branch. (Ok, I don't recall the actual number but it is very low. Like ten or less) but yes, its never fun to lose your job. Especially like this. My heart goes out to them. We'll all Otaku together. Its a shame when one of us has to suffer. We all feel it.

Nov 29, 2008 2:20 PM by internetotaku

-SeRg- said:

Risami said:
i was collecting sola and disgaea 2 manga T_T what i liike about them is that they put color slips at the begining :( i love that.

I think so too ;/
well TokyoPop started putting colors illustrations at the beginning too,so I hope they would license it @_@

Yeah I started noticing that. That would make DelRey's books more wonderful.
Minus the silly mistakes I've seen in their translation and editing.

UPDATE
From ANN

Update: Shizuki Yamashita, the Director of Operations at Broccoli International USA, has confirmed in a blog update that Broccoli Books will not be publishing the remaining volumes of the sola, Galaxy Angel II, Disgaea 2, and Leave it to Piyoko! manga series. At the same time, Yamashita emphasized again that the staffers are working to ensure that the Japanese licensors of these titles can re-license them to other American publishers. Broccoli Books' blog will provide an update if any titles are re-licensed. The corporate parent Broccoli decided on November 19 to dissolve its American subsidiary.

Broccoli International USA will hold one last warehouse sale on December 12 at its Los Angeles office. The staffers will provide more details in the first week of December.

Nov 28, 2008 9:41 PM by VioletRebellion

Risami said:
i was collecting sola and disgaea 2 manga T_T what i liike about them is that they put color slips at the begining :( i love that.

I think so too ;/
well TokyoPop started putting colors illustrations at the beginning too,so I hope they would license it @_@

Nov 26, 2008 4:46 AM by -SeRg-

i was collecting sola and disgaea 2 manga T_T what i liike about them is that they put color slips at the begining :( i love that.

Nov 24, 2008 12:32 PM by Risami

Maora said:

-SeRg- said:
I want to get 2 last vols of Disgaea 2 O_O
it means Broccoli Books is also dissolved ?

if you read a few comments ago. the answer might be solved. they are currently doing their best trying to give their projects to other companies. and some are already racing to get some of them.

Tnx for the info,I hope they will give Disgaea 2 manga project to other company ;/
(TokyoPop - I hope ;_;)

Nov 23, 2008 10:05 PM by -SeRg-

Poor Broccoli.

Nov 22, 2008 10:42 PM by YourMessageHere

EDIT:

Okay, nvm~ I'll just go and buy whatever is out now and hopefully get my hands on the rest of KAMUI by '09…doubtful since I have no money...

Nov 22, 2008 12:09 PM by YoshikoHatake

Shoot, I hope someone decides to pick up my obscure psychic manga, what a bummer. :(

Nov 22, 2008 11:54 AM by Suu

Well...this isn't terribly great.

Nov 22, 2008 1:22 AM by ukonkivi

If Del Rey somehow randomly gets Pandora Hearts, I will be sooooo happy. <3 Del Rey.

Nov 22, 2008 12:33 AM by windy

-SeRg- said:
I want to get 2 last vols of Disgaea 2 O_O
it means Broccoli Books is also dissolved ?

if you read a few comments ago. the answer might be solved. they are currently doing their best trying to give their projects to other companies. and some are already racing to get some of them.

JLS said:
I wanted to pick up Pandora Hearts manga from them. Hopefully YenPress or Del Rey decides to go for it. Sad news indeed. My condolences to those who will lose their jobs.

by looking at the magazines, the possible companies are Yen Press, Tokyopop, or Viz Media, since they all already previously released a manga by that magazine.

Reasons:
Mangas from GFantasy

Yen Press: Higurashi no Naku Koro ni Tatarigoroshi-hen, Nabari no Ou, Zombie-Loan
TOKYOPOP: Saiyuki
Viz Media: Switch

Now, if you look into the company, which it will be Square Enix...... (these are excluding broccoli//according to ANN)

Yen Press: Alice on Deadlines, Bamboo Blade, Black God, Higurashi no Naku Koro ni (some), Hero Tales, Nabari no Ou, Soul Eater, Spiral, Sumomomo Momomo, Zombie Loan,

TOKYOPOP: Bus Gamer, Kindom Hearts, Kingdom Hearts II, Kingdom Hearts Chain of Memories, Saiyuki, Peace Maker,

Digital Manga Publishing: Enchanter,

Viz Media: Fullmetal Alchemist, Nightmare Inspector, The Record of a Fallen Vampire, Switch, 666 satan,

Bandai Entertainment: Ghost Slayers Ayashi,

Seaven Seas Entertainment: He is my Master, I, Otaku,

Media Blasters: Twin Signal

looking at the companies, Yen Press have more chance of getting them.

Nov 21, 2008 11:08 PM by Maora

MistressSheena said:
If you like GA that much, I think some trivial difference in binding won't be an issue. >_>;
Stop being picky, lol. It's just binding. >_>;

Lol, yeah.. but I'm kinda OCD with my organizining...
:D Galaxy Angel will be picked up, most definately.
And hopefully someone will get around to releasing the games!

Nov 21, 2008 8:39 PM by VioletRebellion

I wanted to pick up Pandora Hearts manga from them. Hopefully YenPress or Del Rey decides to go for it. Sad news indeed. My condolences to those who will lose their jobs.

Nov 21, 2008 7:19 PM by Whims

I want to get 2 last vols of Disgaea 2 O_O
it means Broccoli Books is also dissolved ?

Nov 21, 2008 2:26 AM by -SeRg-

That's good news, hopefully someone will then pick up their licenses for Pandora Hearts, E's and the Disgaea novels. Still sad to see them go, espically when a few years ago it seemed possible that Aquarian Age (the original card game) would get realesed over here but that's all come to nothing. Best of Luck in the future though.

Nov 21, 2008 1:05 AM by rah-rah

Ugh, I just remembered all those Kanan artbooks I wanted from their booth at AX. Kept holding off for three years...

Anyway...

Relevant information and possible good news.

Broccoli Japan has announced the dissolution of Broccoli International USA.
This means that Broccoli Books will no longer publish books in North America.

As the operations manager overseeing various aspects of the company, I have lots to do in the next several months. But I’d like to continue to give updates on Broccoli Books production blog periodically about specific titles.

All of the book licenses revert back to the Japanese publishers at the end of this year. And we are working w/ them so that the titles can be released by other US publishers sometime in the future. We are gathering all production material, including finished books that haven’t been printed yet, so that the new licensees will be able to use the materials if they choose to do so.

There are a few titles that are currently in talks already, so hopefully I’ll be able to provide updates until the end of this year.

Also, we still have a lot of requests for dust jackets & stickers for all of our books, and we’ll continue to mail them out until they’re all taken care of. If you want the dust jackets & stickers, please make sure you mail them to us by early December.

Thanks to all of you who read Broccoli Books over the years.
We enjoyed working on every single one of them.

We have a lot of promo goods that will be tossed out at the end of the year, and I’d like to send them to libraries & school clubs as much as possible. If your local library (or school club) is interested in receiving promo goods, please have the librarian or club officer email pr(at)bro-usa.com with the subject line “Broccoli Books Promo Goods”

More updates coming soon.

Nov 21, 2008 12:22 AM by Asrialys

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