Funko Pop Tossing Over $30 Million Worth of Stock into a Landfill

I use to work at Bestbuy and man people were crazy for the funko's a couple years ago . Crazy how things change .

Surely they can give them to charity rather than just bin them

The bubble had to pop eventually… I second the idea of donating them. Surely that’s better than throwing them in a landfill?

Having pop culture tat is cool and all (and I have a handful of them as well), but there does seem to be a point where it's just making stuff for the sake of making stuff. Sure you can have a musician or something, but then having several variations of that same musician when the original one was not a huge seller, seems like a bit of a waste.

I wonder how much stuff Marvel has flushed down the drain over the years.

If I hated Funko Pops before, then I think I despise them even more now.

I had no idea what that is until 5 mins ago

I have some, the sly cooper one is my fav. Not so much of a collecor but they make a nice gift now and again. But having some exclusive to places ir charging 50 quid for some probably didnt help these things sell

@ChronoBreak777
They’ll end up in a landfill regardless, so from an environmental perspective it makes no difference. In fact, in terms of environmental impact, chucking them in more efficiently packed pallets, transported in more efficiently packed lorries, is likely to be better. It is the fact that they over manufactured them in the first place that was the bad environmental thing.

Still, I’m sure they could put a smile on some kids faces.

I’ve always hated these things. They seem to take over any shop that starts to sell them.

Should give them away to orphanages or something.

Donate them to charity, I'm sure theres plenty of kids (and adults) all over the world who would be happy to recieve some

Surely selling them off cheap would be better? Can’t see this move doing their public image any good at all.

@UltimateOtaku91 my thoughts exactly there's unfortunately alot of kids been misplaced with the war and Turkey earthquakes who have lost everything, sure they would be overjoyed to get some toys

@QualityGeezer

They should, but they believe it is cheaper to throw them away because if they give away the figures, that could impact future sales.

This is an outrage. I've never been interested in Funko Pops, but I am not even less interested knowing how wasteful and environmentally hostile the company is.

Not much point getting upset about a Funko Pop landfill whilst using technology made from exploited labour. As for the planet, it will do just fine with or without us. It's gone through several mass extinctions, suffered many ice ages, asteroid strikes, huge mass coronal ejections, massive tectonic shifts ect, we could nuke ourselves back to the stone age and the planet will recover in time.

I guess it’s cheaper for them to landfill them than.
Give them to charity logistics wise
Deliver them to shops and sell very cheap logistics wise.

Such a shame for the charities, will never buy another pop or the companies products again.

@riceNpea I’ve always found it interesting to know that 99% of all species that ever lived on our planet are now extinct.

I was obsessed with Funko POPS 5-6 years ago, now I only buy Spider-Man POPS, a handful of very specific Disney POPS like Stitch, WALL.E, Bill Cipher & Winnie the Pooh, and the occasional Video Game related POPS like Kratos, Sly Cooper, Monokuma & The Phantom Thieves (Persona 5)
My Aunt runs an Op Shop and I give her many of the Funko POPS I bought on a whim (years ago) for her to sell at her shop and apparently they sell quickly, so she makes a decent profit out of them.

I'm not a fan of Funko Pops, but just tossing them into a landfill seems like a massive waste.

They could literally donate them to charity and use it as a write off 🤦‍♂️🤦‍♂️🤦‍♂️

Guess no one wants those Harry and Meghan Funkos...

@ItsBritneyB_tch it's a sobering statistic, or at least it should be. It's not even as if this human civilisation is the first on the planet, though it's what we are taught.

Sell them for 2$ 3$, but I guess they don't want to dilute the price of the others, capitalism.

Garbage quite literally, never owned one, they're absolutely ugly.

As someone who's more of a LEGO BrickHeadz collector, tossing Funko pops into the landfill is a huge waste.

Hated these from the very first time I saw one, such soulless, soulless designs. Those beady eyes. All the knock-offs are horrendous too. The West could do with a reset in terms of what we do and don't value when it comes to material possessions. Vinyl figures, artificially scarce or not, ain't it.

Should the planet not melt down completely and humanity die out, whatever apex predator comes after us eons from now will wonder whether they happened upon a mass grave when they find this landfill.

I dislike most useless tat, consumerism is just depressing at the best of times, but this really brings it home how pointless the society we've created for ourselves is 😂😂😂😂

We f***ed up, and we've got to own that.

In the UK we get boatloads of this absolute sh** from China, I remember when there was the incident in the suez canal, and on the news there was this guy who sold novelty aprons and plastic gimmick sh** like this, who got it all imported from China, but oh no, it's been delayed because a boat got stuck, and now his loyal sh** customers can't buy his utter garbage, and that's what it is, it's literally just the rubbish/garbage of the future, nothing of any worth or any material that can be repurposed, it's just importing waste, that we then export back to Asia in its true waste form to dump back into the environment.

We will never learn.

The least companies like this could do with their imported garbage is set aside some of their useless stock and donate it to kids who'd at least get maybe a little bit of joy from owning this sh** before it's tossed in a bin. I don't know, 5% of the stock people might actually recognise could at least do some good for a short time.

Then if they'd just bankrupt themselves and f*** off with the rest of these companies, it'd be cool 😁😁😁😁😁😁😁😁

Idk guys, this seems like the kinda thing that happens every day on a smaller scale at just about any place that manufactures anything. I work in printing, for example, and the amount of chemicals and paper and just all kinds of materials that get thrown out is staggering. On a daily basis.

Not saying either is good... but maybe we could dial back the "funkos are ruining the planet" rhetoric. Like, we're on a PlayStation fansite after all. None of our hands are particularly clean.

Why not give them away instead 🙈

Though this does remind of how ag ended up leaving many a harvest to sit and rot during the depression because it was simply cheaper. Sigh.

@Americansamurai1 The orphans have it hard enough without these ugly things staring at them all day.

@Vorflynn no way , did they actually do funko pops of them 🙈

Could they not just tell people where theyre storing them ,the place would be emptied in an hour ,all the grubby humans will take any old crap for free,I mean look at the moronic behaviour over that prime drink ,sugar water and people went mental ,people....I'm not a fan.

@zupertramp the quicker the human race wipes itself out the better in my opinion, thats why I dont recycle ,and spray copious amounts of deodorant into the sky,im helping the planet that way in the long term.

Problem is they were making them for any old crap, not just cult stuff. The labyrinth movie ones were neat, I have a Dexter's lab one. But yeh they're kind of pants if I'm being honest

That's what I think about every special edition of a game that includes a plastic statue. Just dust collectors and eventually junk. It's fine to have fun stuff, but just produce it on order basis. But no, people need there things right away.

@EarlyBird94 so yeah I definitely don't wanna come off callous in regards to the environment. I do care. A great deal. But you've touched on something very accurate in that people are usually quick to codemn some form of waste so long as it's something they aren't really interested in.

@tallythwack lol well I mean I know that's all a bit sarcastic but as others have pointed out, the planet is fine. We're simply endangering our ability to live on it. So I mean, I wouldn't get too worried about the planet just for the sake of the planet.

Surely there must be a way of giving them away for free which doesn't cost the company anything. Even if they just told people where to go to collect them I'm sure alot of people would travel a good distance to get free Pops.

Forgot to mention the problem that every business fantasize about unlimited growth, no matter how unessential their product is... yay for capitalism.

@riceNpea The planet may continue to be a ball of rock that exists regardless of what we do. But how we go about utilising its resources collectively will determine how pleasant it is for us to live on.

Making stuff from non-renewable resources, then throwing it away makes our situation imperceptibly worse. It is therefore in principle is something worth being annoyed about.

They just never looked very good to me.

They could just give it all away but corporations aren’t in the “giving away “business. For instance, when I worked at Burger King, 25 years ago, at night we would always throw away any food that didn’t get sold. One night I tried to take a couple burgers and the GM told me I have to write it up and toss it out. I told him that’s a waste of food and he says “Well, we don’t give stuff away…” What sense does that make?

I remember my daughter and loom bands 🙈.

@tameshiyaku yep. Looking for unlimited growth for an unnecessary product. So dumb!

I always cringe at 'collectors' of these things. They represent everything wrong with blind consumerism: cheaply made, mass produced plastic junk that is sometimes artificially made rare to increase prices. To think that people throw their hard earned money at this...

In their defence they haven't stated that they are going to landfill have they? We're assuming a bit there I think.
Though they've never appealed to me either. I suspect it's just another product that most people are buying in the hope they are worth more one day.

Horrible things. What a waste though, guess nobody wants the stuff Disney is pushing now.

@Ryall but it is all renewable. I said don't worry about the planet, it'll be fine. I wasn't talking about us living on it.
Oil reserves can easily be built back up. Not on human time scales obviously but there's plenty of organic matter that will die and form the basis of new natural resources. And don't buy into the narative that it's running out. Billions of years of organic matter is embedded all over the Earth's mantle. We've barely scratched the surface of the planet's bedrock, like a mosquito bite on a whale's arse. All the nonsense about 50 years of oil left is scaremongering.

How we all go about using the resources is not the problem. How we don't share it is. There's plenty of resources for everyone but we don't live in a society that is interested in sharing, we live in one that puts profit at the top of what is important. Climate change politics isn't about making the world a better place, it's about changing the narrative to a new way towards profit.

If you want to worry about resources, worry about how difficult it is to find helium on this planet and how wasteful we are with it. Worry about cobalt strip mining and exploited labour. Worry about the destruction of ecosystems to grow monocrops that does far more extensive damage than meat production. Worry about the military industrial complex perpetuating war for profit and putting us on the brink of a thermo-nuclear exchange nearly as serious as the Cuban missile crisis.

Yea this is wrong. This company should be forced to flip the bill to recycle these, or something better than this. Makes me never want to buy anything from them again.

This is disgraceful. I hope at least they try to recycle any materials, packaging, parts etc that they’re able to.

Or as someone else said donate them to kids or whatever.

If there are any Joel Miller pop's going into this landfill I won't be happy. Been looking for one for the last year.

Melt them all down. And the real MGK too

Beanie Babies 2.0, now with more soullessness.

@Stevey_Mac I have a Joel and an Ellie. And it drives me crazy that it's a Part 1 Joel but a Part 2 Ellie. It's bizarre the characters that get Funko's and the ones who don't. You'd think a Part 1 Joel and Ellie or a Part 2 Joel and Ellie would be a no brainer but nah, one from each lol.

i want some now

Some of the most interesting and thought provoking comments that I have read on this site.

Unfortunately probably not enough personal or political will to solve any of these 'insurmountable' problems. As human beings, we are mostly reactive, not proactive IMO. A lot more people will have to have their quality of life significantly impacted before they maybe give a $#!+.

Glad that several people have pointed out that we are not 'saving the planet' but saving our (mostly worthless?) backsides.

People still actually buy these?

I never understood this particular craze. They're so ugly with the big black eyes, and look nothing like the characters they're supposed to represent.

It's beanie babies but fuglier. Why does this exist?

@adamnovice "They just took thousands of pop culture icons and made them all homogeneous, taking away anything meaningful of the character."

Isn't that basically the central pillar of all modern culture?

I wonder how many of them are there that collectors cannot reach? Or which exactly they want to destroy by the most unecological way?

Are they going to put them in beside ET? They should def give them away. Like could even raffle a load off. Raffles seem to make loads of money. In their efforts to make more money they've made tons of crap. Thinking that die hard fans would buy the crap and its backfired on them. Because most people even die hards were only buying the ones that interested them.

@Yinx Im sure people cringe at the idea of people spending money to waste time playing videogames.

@Yinx If you like a character and get happy with buying one what does it matter I have a mini Aloy because she looked cute a Batgirl, Chell. But it's ridiculous that they throw away so many things instead of giving them to charity.

@zupertramp Yeah the coolest characters get nothing but 6 different versions of the same marvel character is a need....

@AdamNovice I totally agree that they make way to many of certain characters to make them less special.

Just a case of mankind making stupid products and even more stupid actions for damage control. Do not be fooled, every system has a limit, even the planet.

I'm a five star sociopath and my brain still took three seconds to bring up the idea of maybe directing all this stock into charity giveaways instead. Don't tell me that none at Funko ever did.🤔🙄

What a waste to the environment, plastic does not erode over time, this is very irresponsible of this company

I never liked these plastic toys in the 1st place, overpriced tat so maybe others thought the same, the only people who liked these things are social media influencers trying to get others to buy it instead 🙄😤

@TeapotBuddha well at least someone else agrees with me 🙂

how about a huge fire sale? I'd probably buy one if the price was right.

Was thinking about getting one or two. Now there's no way in hell. What an utterly terrible decision.

@huyi
I got all the Assassin's Creed ones for free in a promotion, I don't even know where they are anymore. Then again, I don't know what the day is now-a-days.

Shameful
What a waste of materials. This kind of product should always be produced based on preorders and not on market speculations. There should be more laws and restrictions about this, its horrible on environnement.

@rumple1980 a huge fire would also take care of the problem.

@QualityGeezer I say the same about cars at my work we build, if one defect isn't right even if it is fully built they write them off. I always say can sell them cheaper or use them in a better way but instead they write them off through insurance and then scrap them, waste or materials and usage.

I don’t understand why they don’t slash prices to the bone on them and see what money they can recoup. I mean, something is better than nothing, right?

@Flaming_Kaiser indeed. They make the joke about unsold MGK's and it's funny because it's true. Like multiple versions of a halfway popular artist whose demographic imo doesn't immediately jump out as the Funko demo. But yeah then you throw in all the marvel and star wars variations and all the different sized figures they have now and dioramas of bands on a stage and you can see why they're tanking financially, the way they just flooded the market.

@Bricktop33 except that'd poison the air around the warehouse, plastic needs to be disposed of correctly, the fumes of burning plastic is noxious.

Charity would have been better

While I love nendoroid, I can't stand the souless eyes and the barely recognize design of Funkos.

A perfect analogy of capitalism; harm the environment to seek profit, over-produce stuff that is no longer wanted nor profitable, and then don't even donate them for free when no one wants the excess, just shove it underground, consequences be damned. Its not even these toys specifically, it's the entire mindset that leads to this waste. Shameful to all involved.

Such a useless waste, they should have just given this stuff to children for free.

@huyi plastic does erode over time. Why would you think it doesn't? Everything is subject to entropy.

@Americansamurai1
Agreed. I immediately thought the same thing. I bet there are kids all over the world who'd love some distraction and a chance to do what kids do.

@riceNpea Thats why the ocean is full with plastic. And yes it erodes but it takes ages and it gets everywhere.

The E.T. videogame for the Atari 2600 anyone?

@zupertramp The only thing I like from them is Rock Candy statues and a few Funko Pop statues from things like Aloy but it's just to much and it makes them not special. I totally agree they tanked their product with overproduction.

@QualityGeezer

Right? Or an orphanage if nothing else. I have quite a few Funko pops I don't want to deal with anymore and I plan on gift wrapping them and donating them to a local orphanage for Christmas

@Flaming_Kaiser the plastic in the ocean, over 80% comes from Asian river sources. Most of the rest comes from marine operations, such as nets and vessels. Very little is commercial waste like Funko Toys. But at least we can agree that plastic does break down, unlike the other chap 😊👍

@riceNpea It breaks down but it takes ages and it breaks down into microplastic that poisons us and try environment. You know that when we eat fish it comes in our own body because fish eat the microplastic.

And plastic everything thats thrown away so wastefully without shame is not acceptable. Even if 80% is from Asia you have to start somewhere in the west we waste so much plastic on packaging of things like our food to name something. Every small but helps don't forget the US and China are the biggest polluters in the world.

@NEStalgia I agree total overproduction made these things as special as a loaf of bread.

@Flaming_Kaiser we do have to start somewhere but the current guilt trip in the West to make you and I responsible for tackling climate change is *****. Like you say plastic gets into the ocean. That's not us doing it, that's industry. US and China are polluters, absolutely.

@riceNpea Well it's not the poor people in 3rd world countries it's time for us to change. China, Europe the US and everyone else otherwise it's to late.

@Flaming_Kaiser we don't need to change, industry does. What we do is nothing compared to that. That's the lie were are sold as a measure of control. And there's no need for people to be in a 3rd world.

If there were a real want to change the world we would share resources and raise up those nations. Its a joke that Africa is poor. It is rich with resources but its political corruption that keeps it down.

Theres no need for anyone to be poor, hungry or homeless so the government telling me I need to recycle, it will save the planet...they can eff off with that rubbish. I do it because it's just as easy to do than not but not for a moment do I think it will make a difference. I'm not that naive.

@riceNpea Its not about money alone. Diseases that coming from pollution is not lie it's a fact.

And as a person who lives below the sea surface I rather not drown or wipeout even more species with pollution.

Your are not naive? I wont start a bad conversation here but it's not one person who needs to change its the whole world. And it's nonsense that one person can't change anything you only need one person to get the ball rolling.

Martin Luther King, Gandhi and many more started something that changed the world people only need to be less selfish and work towards a better world together.

Maybe let discount stores / dollar stores / pound shops come pick them up. Surely they can sell some of them.