Funko Pops, Funko Peak, FUUUnko
If you don’t know what Funko Pops are, save yourself and stop reading right now, because Funko Pops are a trap. I say this wholeheartedly as a fair warning. Once you get one, it’s like you can’t stop, unless you have more willpower than me, then good for you, I applaud you. It doesn’t help that I have this knack for collecting things. So when I first saw these Funko Pops being sold, I tried with everything I had in me to not collect them, because I didn’t want to start a new collection. Fast forward a few years later, and I wish I had started sooner.
There are many shops that revolve around collectibles — comics, cards, toys. Now, there are so many shops that bank on these Funko Pops alone. Like I said, it’s a trap. There are stores that dedicate their entire livelihood on these Funko Pops. Some stores are doing better than others, and you can tell by looking at their Instagram page.
Enter: Funko Peak
This store is based in Los Angeles, California. It literally, only sells Pop toys. I’m not sure when the physical store opened, but all their online activities including their own website, seems to have started in Spring 2016. They have an active site where you can purchase pops, and it does free shipping within the USA, but you probably have to pay extra if you want it shipped anywhere else. They’re on social media. However, their Twitter only has 188 followers, and Facebook has only 1,548 likes… BUT! Their Instagram has 17,000 followers! So what’s with the discrepancy of followers across the various social media platforms?
Well for one, Instagram is a visual medium and people that love pops, love looking at pops. Funko Peak updates their page daily with new pops that just arrived or sales that are happening. They make use of the hashtags in order to reach more Instagram users. It also helps that they are constantly posting rare pop toys. They don’t really post commons (which are ones that you can find at your local EB Games or Hot Topic easily). Rare pops are super hard to find, so they easily grab more eyeballs, because people are constantly looking for these kinds of pops. They also engage with their customers via Instagram — whether it be answering questions, or posting updates on shipments, or sales that are happening. As for the photos itself, they’re by no means a ‘professionally taken photograph’ nor about the ‘aesthetics’, but it does what it needs to do — showcase their stock with clear and crisp photos. Sometimes the store would even host raffles where you can buy a mystery box for a certain price, with a chance of a super rare pop being in it (which you paid way less for). So that really appealed to many collectors being a fan of this shop early on.
So marketing wise — daily posts of good stuff on Instagram really attracts customers to buy from their store and check their page daily. And if you’re into collecting Funko Pops, and find yourself in the area, you have to visit this place!
