Why the Japanese company behind Pac-Man isn’t changing a thing with its first U.S. store
Tapping into the popularity of anime and video games among younger generations, one of the largest Japanese video game publishers aimed to be as authentic as possible when opening its first store in the U.S.
Bandai Namco — which has eight stores in Japan and also recently opened one in London — plans to open its Cross Store on Friday in Brooklyn, New York’s Japan Village in Industry City. The store has 10 sections featuring collectibles, card games, figures and other items from different Bandai Namco brands, from classic arcade games like Pac-Man to the One Piece anime-inspired card game and Tamagotchi digital pets.
It’s unashamedly Japanese, with the same kinds of products and attractions that guests would find in stores in Tokyo. There’s a wall of vending machines, called Gashapon, with knobs that customers can twist to randomly expense small capsules with toys in them. Guests can also buy tokens to use arcade machines; one from the Taiko no Tatsujin video game series sits in the back with giant bongo drums that can be banged on to the rhythm of the music.
Junko Fukamachi, gm for Bandai Namco Amusement America’s IP business division, said the company decided to open the store because of the growing popularity of anime globally; she added that American tourists were frequent visitors of its first Cross Store in Japan that opened in 2022. Around the same time, the company also experimented with a Brooklyn pop-up featuring gachapon toy-capsule vending. And it hosted another one, showcasing the One Piece card game, in December 2024. The success of both of those pop-ups convinced Bandai Namco to open a store in Brooklyn.
Fukamachi said the store, from customer service to quality and content, is basically unchanged from the company’s locations in Japan. “We want it to be the same all over the world,” she told Modern Retail.
Rebekah Kondrat, managing partner of physical retail agency Rekon, said right now is a favorable time for Japanese culture and gaming brands to open stores because Gen Z and Gen Alpha use gaming as a time of social interaction.
“A well-thought-out environment that allows the Gen-Z consumer to both connect with the brand and expand their community will build brand affinity and allow the gaming companies to acquire new customers,” Kondrat said in an email. She added that the physical environment also allows the gaming companies to showcase their collaborative relationships with other brands, celebrities and influencers in real life. “These collaborations are some of the more successful engagement drivers for gaming companies, and having a physical space in addition to a virtual one will help create more hype for the gaming platforms.”
Kondrat said cities like New York that already have strong Japanese-influenced cultural elements, such as streetwear scenes, cultural events or restaurants, are ideal for these sorts of stores. Nintendo, another Japanese gaming company, has similarly had a presence at Rockefeller Center since 2005.
“Landlords, especially on high streets, are looking for tenants that will drive traffic — in particular, young consumers coming into disposable income,” Kondrat said.
Bandai Namco landed at Japan Village, part of the 6 million-square-foot Industry City development, hoping to tap into anime fans who already frequent the complex. New York real estate broker Jim Somoza, managing director for Industry City, said he started Japan Village in 2017 in hopes of bringing a Japanese grocery store to Brooklyn and evoke the feeling of traveling to a village square in Japan. Operated by Japanese entrepreneur Tony Yoshida and his family, it began with a 20,000-square-foot Sunrise Mart grocery store and various food stalls of ramen, udon, curry and tempura.
“We started it with the thought that you should feel like you’re in Japan in a real way, certainly not in an Epcot way,” Somoza said, referring to the World Showcase attraction at Walt Disney World that mimics different countries. “As somebody who’s traveled through Japan many times, I just feel like I’m in another cool world when I’m there. When I walk into these new places — and Bandai Namco is spot on for that — I feel like I’m there; the signage is right, the feel is right.”
Somoza said one of the things he liked about the Bandai Namco store, as Fukamachi said, is that it wasn’t adjusted for American audiences. “We don’t want an Americanized version of it; we want what’s in Japan,” Somoza said. “We want it to be a little confusing, a little crazy, a little wild.”
As a whole, Somoza said Industry City aims to provide experience-based retailers and not typical commodity retailers. The Bandai Namco store is no exception, including areas for playing card games and arcade games and spaces for classes and tournaments. Fukamachi said she and her team aim to build community and not just sell products.
“Our retail is all quirky, experiential and interesting,” he said. “We’ve got a blacksmith, things like that, and brewers, distillers and other things that you wouldn’t normally find in retail, and I think that is what retail is and should be for the future.”