History of Funko!

Funko Inc. was founded in 1998 by Mike Becker.  The original driving idea behind the Funko brand was to create nostalgia-themed toys.  Funko’s first manufactured bobble head was of the well-known restaurant advertising icon Big Boy. One of their first successful products that were produced which was the Austin Powers bobblehead which sold 80,000 units. This opened the door for new licenses and deals which included creating products for the Grinch, Tony the Tiger, and the famous Cheerios mascot honeybee.

In 2005 Funko was sold to Brian Mariotti who began to significantly increase the company’s licensed product lines. In 2011 Funko began releasing its Pop! Vinyl line of figures. By 2012 the company had sold more than 20 million worth of products. By 2016 the company had outgrown its original headquarters in Everett Washington and announced plans to move to a building downtown with more space and a retail store. The new 17,000 square foot flagship store was opened on August 19, 2017 in downtown Everett.

Funko was also listed on the NASDAQ stock exchange on November 2, 2017, but suffered the worst initial public offering of the 21st century, with shares falling by 40 percent and only raising 125 million.

The company opened its second storefront in November 2019, located in Hollywood, Los Angeles. It has 40,000 square feet of space and includes life-size statues and interactive movie sets. Both stores offer limited products as well that you can only get from one of these two locations.

Funko has created over 14,000 different products in dozens of different toy lines. They have created a mascot in Freddy Funko which serves as the companies face to the public. The first product was the wacky wobbler line. These are bobbleheads that depict various characters mainly from pop culture. In 2010 a preview line of Pop! Products were released at San Diego Comic-Con. The product line was fully revealed in the 2011 New York Toy Fair.

Within the Funko Pop! product line there are several sublines There is a series known as Pop! Rides  which feature a figure inside of a vehicle. The Funko Pop! line also has figures that are larger than the standard figure, in 6-inch, 10-inch, 18-inch, and the now-retired 9-inch size. In addition, Funko produces Pop! Deluxes, where a character is seated on external set pieces. Funko has also begun creating Movie and Comic Moments, which feature posed Pop! figures interacting with each other and on display bases in ways that replicate moments from different movies and comic books. At Toy Fair 2019, Funko announced a new line of Pop! Vinyl figures; Pop! Town. This line includes a Pop! Vinyl figure alongside a stylized version of a landmark building from the source material.

There are various other Funko lines as well. In 2015 at Toy Funko announced a new offshoot brand called Vinyl Sugar, with lines including Dorbz, Vinyl Idolz, Vinyl Vixens, and Super Deluxe Vinyls. In March 2018, Funko announced Funko Cereal, including mini-Pop! characters inside each box. Dorbz typically have a round smiling head and cylindrical body. Dorbz are smaller than the normal Funko Pop! Figure. Mystery Minis is another Funko line. The Mystery Mini series consists of a group of blind boxes that have a random character within, from a variety of series. The figures are styled differently than the other Funko products in different and unique ways. Other current product lines include Hikari, Legacy Collection, Fabrikations, Mopeez, and Rock Candy. Former product lines include Spastik Plastik, Blox, FunkoVision, Funko Plushies, Funko Force, Reaction Figures, and Wacky Wobblers. information