In August 2022, online anime and manga store Right Stuf was sold to major anime streaming and licensing company Crunchyroll. Now, Right Stuf has announced that it will no longer exist and its content will be integrated into the Crunchyroll Store as of October 10. With that comes what I (and apparently many others) believe is the end of an era. I haven’t felt this way since Geocities closed.
I first learned about Right Stuf Anime around 2005 or 2006, and have been a regular customer since my first order: DVD Eureka Seven Volume 1. At the time I didn’t have much income Available, their regular sales are a great way to earn more for less. Those sales are often based on a single anime or manga publisher, so it also becomes a practical method to familiarize yourself with what a particular company has to offer. Although my memory is spotty, this was most likely the first site I bought anime online from (It was either them or Deep Discount DVD).
Right Stuf doesn’t always offer the absolute best deals. For example, in its time, Amazon has grown into a giant in online retail. It’s not uncommon for items to have better prices on Amazon, but I almost exclusively choose to buy on Right Stuf because the company shows so much care in its products in so many ways. You almost never have to worry about the packaging getting damaged, and they even try to eliminate the use of plastic and make it more environmentally sustainable. If you purchase an item the day before it goes on sale, you can email them and request to amend the order. And at the end of the day, sales were still very good.
No of course everything is a rainbow. I once lost a package and had to go through a lot of hoops—including reporting it to the police—but the positives outweigh the negatives by a mile.
Another strength is that the company maintains something of an old-school feel. Much of American anime culture over the past 15 years or so has incorporated more and more aspects of general fandom/geek media, and while those are great, they can often be overshadowing the anime and manga aspects. The fact that Right Stuf is still primarily devoted to Japanese pop culture after all these years (while still incorporating the broader fanbase) is something I really appreciate.
I’m certainly concerned that without the Right Stuf brand and the weight of customer expectations that fans have come to expect, the savings won’t be the same. I came across the Crunchyroll Store, and while I wouldn’t put it past them to offer merchandise in an accessible way, I never thought about buying from there as long as Right Stuf was around. And although my life is a far cry from what it was in 2006, I know that’s not the case for everyone—especially young anime fans (at least those interested in the medium). physics), who have had to deal with things like the terrible economy brought on by a life-changing, generational pandemic. And I just didn’t expect the Crunchyroll Store to have the more personal touch that Right Stuf has.
Crunchyroll might surprise me. They can maintain a lot of the things that Right Stuf did, well, yeah. But the fact that they even shelved the Right Stuf name doesn’t bode well in my opinion. I can give them a chance, but chance is all they get. With Right Stuf, what I have is trust and faith.