Funko nearing bankruptcy

Schizm said:
Is this a thing that can be done? I've only ever seen mergers undone like that on TV and even then it's not believable. :)
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I mean if Funko has no leverage whatsoever to stop Mondo from declaring solvency and they are in no way of needing to suck on Funko’s teat then I’m sure they’ll be able to walk away in a better position


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Mondo didn't sell to Funko because the business was a success, they were in trouble.

I'm sure there are cost savings being under the Funko umbrella, but it was not (and probably still isn't) profitable. If Funko goes down, Mondo will go with them, unless spun off (but who would buy in this environment?).

Former Mondo employees have already started a Mondo-like business - hopefully they are more financially savvy and can step in to pick up Mondo lines & continue them, but who knows?
 
JRoug said:
Mondo didn't sell to Funko because the business was a success, they were in trouble.

I'm sure there are cost savings being under the Funko umbrella, but it was not (and probably still isn't) profitable. If Funko goes down, Mondo will go with them, unless spun off (but who would buy in this environment?).

Former Mondo employees have already started a Mondo-like business - hopefully they are more financially savvy and can step in to pick up Mondo lines & continue them, but who knows?
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You got it backwards, Funko acquired Mondo. Mondo didn’t sell. Funko may be in serious financial jeopardy but they are still a huge company compared to mondo, which caters to more of a niche market. Mondo could not offer Funko a check big enough that would dig them out of the hole that they were in. But despite the fact that Funko is hemorrhaging, they still have a lot more capital to throw around when needed.

That being said, when Funko finally bleeds itself dry and mondo is still selling overpriced items out the ass because they still have a dedicated speculator market of their own, I think they’ll do just fine. Just look at how people are gushing over the latest Daredevil and Storm figures that came and went. No one would accuse Mondo of not knowing who their audience is


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Stoopid_Sandwich said:
Judging from the articles I’ve read it sounds like the reason why Funko isn’t doing so hot is because their portfolio isn’t diversified enough to keep them solvent. Their business model has been to pump out as many Funko pops as possible and now they are too over saturated and no one is buying. It’s basically the beanie baby bubble.

Mondo however has a smaller portfolio but it’s more diversified and financially solvent because they still make money on nearly all of their products sold like gangbusters over the last ten years. And remember, it was Funko who purchased Mondo in a desperate attempt to remain financially stable in the first place because they were routinely forced into a position where they had to do round after round of mass layoffs to eliminate overhead. So they tried merging with a successful company and that hasn’t worked either. Buying a successful company like mondo in hopes that they will keep Funko afloat will not erase the fact that we still have an over saturation issue with too many POP vinyls on the market and no retailer can sell them and therefore has no intention of doing business with Funko ever again. I fully expect that now that Funko might possibly file for Chapter 7, Mondo will dissolve the merger themselves and be like “Thanks for letting us use your parking passes and company bathrooms, but we’re good.”


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I think mondo was owned by Alamo theaters before and were sold off during the pandemic.

I’m sure that if funko ever gets in a bad enough financial situation someone will purchase or merge with them, or be willing to buy mondo at least.

But sucks for the people at mondo if it’s sold again within 5 years
 
As far as I understand it, Funko owns Mondo. The only way for Mondo to extricate itself from the Funko umbrella is basically to buy itself back unless there was a very creative deal struck initially. If you cut off the head, the limbs don't just go off and do their own thing, they're left to die.
 
Misfit said:
As far as I understand it, Funko owns Mondo. The only way for Mondo to extricate itself from the Funko umbrella is basically to buy itself back unless there was a very creative deal struck initially. If you cut off the head, the limbs don't just go off and do their own thing, they're left to die.
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In theory; they're still separate companies. If Funko is going under, they could divvy up their holdings, like Mondo, and sell them off. So Mondo wouldn't just become 'Mondo.' But maybe it would become 'Mondo, a subsidiary of NECA.' For example. Is Funko likely to do that? It depends on a LOT of things. It would 100% not surprise me, though, to see Mondo sold for a few million bucks and then all of a sudden a Funko CEO magically has a few million dollar golden parachute as Funko announces it's shuttering.
 
Funko would likely file for Chapter 11 first, and hope to reorganize. During that time, once they got rid of some debt, they could continue on or they could look for a buyout - or they could sell off some IP. I think that despite the disdain for POPS in this thread, that the Funko name and that IP could be attractive to a Hasbro or Mattel (or another firm) as they are different in terms of product and have store retail space set aside.

Mondo - not sure their name is that big and if what they do would be viewed as complimentary enough to a company already making action figures to be considered something worth paying too much for. Especially as toy company may not care about posters and albums and so on.
 
fac said:
Funko would likely file for Chapter 11 first, and hope to reorganize. During that time, once they got rid of some debt, they could continue on or they could look for a buyout - or they could sell off some IP. I think that despite the disdain for POPS in this thread, that the Funko name and that IP could be attractive to a Hasbro or Mattel (or another firm) as they are different in terms of product and have store retail space set aside.

Mondo - not sure their name is that big and if what they do would be viewed as complimentary enough to a company already making action figures to be considered something worth paying too much for. Especially as toy company may not care about posters and albums and so on.
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I don’t think that Mondo has enough artists and designers to function solely as a toy company. I think there will always be a facet of their business that caters to niche merchandising in addition to toys. It’s part of the reason why this company has been a triple threat for all these years


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I don't see what Mondo provides that a million other companies don't. Are they potentially saleable to help Funko's situation/help their CEO loot some coffers? Maybe. But they don't really have much of an identity. Before Funko bought them they just seemed like the merchandise wing of Alamo, selling super, super-limited run vinyl records and prints (I remember once being logged on at noon for an In the Mood for Love drop, and the poster being sold out by the time I was trying to check out at 12:01) that screamed hobbyist business more than anything. I get that the exclusivity model combined with figures in uncommon scales probably work for them, but I'd be concerned that they don't have the scalability to survive on their own. The limited frequency of their output feels like an impediment in a market that's pretty saturated with collector stuff. I'd be curious whether they're having more success with common properties like He-Man and Batman or with niche stuff with far fewer merch options like Daria and Over the Garden Wall.

I don't know that their brand is meaningful enough that NECA or someone would buy them instead of just potentially doing the same thing they do using their greater recognition and credibility. Funko buying them/merging with them/whatever this is feels like a function of the situation where their name is such a target of scorn and mockery in collector's circles, an issue that's largely exclusive to them and their POPs business model.
 
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secondwhiteline said:
I don't know that their brand is meaningful enough that NECA or someone would buy them instead of just potentially doing the same thing they do using their greater recognition and credibility.
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Devil's Advocate on this is that Mondo's name is worth something to the people NECA (or whomever) would want to sell that type of product to. If NECA were like 'we will also make 12" cartoon X-Men' maybe people wouldn't be really enthused, would feel like the quality won't match or the 'heart' won't be in it like Mondo. But, marketing being what it is, slap the name 'Mondo' on it and everyone accepts it as a continuation of what Mondo was doing under Funko and you avoid potentially splitting the fanbase they've built.

Assuming, of course, sales data shows that the fanbase is worth spending the money to hold onto. But sometimes a name DOES matter. But, like you, I'm not necessarily convinced that Mondo's name recognition in the collecting space has the good will and power behind it that some people want to believe. It may, it may. But it may not.
 
secondwhiteline said:
I don't see what Mondo provides that a million other companies don't.
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As a Mondo fan outside of toys, its the prints, posters, and vinyl (music not sofubi). Specifically how Mondo executes. They have a unique grip on pulp culture as far as what they like to yank the nostalgia chain with. There are properties, no one else touches like Josie and the Pussycats 2001 film, and there are properties that they just have a unique filter for.

Now yes, Bottleneck Gallery and other publishers and distributors exist in the same space, but it's the specific pool of talent and offerings they put out that sets them apart.

This might be past tense. I feel there has been a downgrade in output and cool ideas since Funko came in.

Can other companies lift it and repeat? Probably. But it hasn't had to happen yet.

But to me, Mondo is Coca Cola vs other galleries Sam's Choice. Fair or not.
 
I was a fan of Mondo from their early screen print days, back when they would have instant sellouts of posters by Tyler Stout, Olly Moss, and others. Things seemed to go down hill when their creative director Justin Ishmael left back in 2015. When Funko fired half the staff, including the co-founders, anything that was left that made Mondo unique was clearly gone.
 
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