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The History of the Marusan Company
In 1947 Naokichi Ishida’s sons, Haruyasu Ishida and his younger brother Minoru Ishida, and kinsman Yasuo Arai founded MARUSAN in the toy industry. Their business also was mainly selling tin toys and optical toys. In 1950, the company was formally incorporated as MARUSAN SHOTEN LTD. "Shoten" means company or shop. At the time of incorporation, Haruyasu Ishida was President; Minoru Ishida was listed as Managing Director and Yasuo Arai was a Director.
Toy exports from Japan grew rapidly during the 1950s
and the toy manufacturers sought to produce specific toys as requested
by the US importers. In 1953, they introduced the now famous and
successful, elaborate tin toy "Cadillac" based on a 1951
model. This car and the variations of In addition to cars, other transportation toys were popular in the 1950s. These included trucks, trains, planes, buses, racing cars and boats. Their colorful tin banks, many of which were made for the Japanese domestic market, were also introduced during this period. In 1954 they launched the tin toy SSN submarine
series and a vinyl "Mammy doll". 1955 saw the introduction of
the very durable "Bulldog toy" series of tin toys. These extra
strong toys (including ride-on toys) are identified by the bulldog sign,
which was often attached to the cab door of the truck. Other successful toys of he 1950s were the pipe-smoking toys, including battery operated "Jolly Daddy or Jolly Jumbo Smoking Elephant", "Smoky Bear", "Magic Man", "Smoking Grandpa", "Smoking Bunny", "Smoking PaPa Bear", "Mr. Mac Pooch" and a windup "Smoking Donkey". In 1960 President Haruyasu Ishida retired and Minoru Ishida was appointed president. The 1960s saw Marusan venture into die-cast miniature cars called "Toyo Ace" and plastic model kits of small airplanes.
1968 brought the unexpected bankruptcy of Marusan due to unique circumstances. However, the bankruptcy of Marusan eventually led to the establishment of two companies: In1969 Minoru Ishida, the president of Marusan Shoten Ltd. and Maruzan Co.,Ltd. rebuilt Marusan as Marusan Co., Ltd. At the same time, Koutaro Ishida, who was a director of these companies and a nephew of Minoru Ishida, built a new company named Bullmark along with two other ex-employees of Marusan, Saburo Ishizuki and Yutaka Shibata. Bullmark was a major producer of plastic kits and vinyl monster character toys until 1977 when it closed its doors. Meanwhile Marusan was also very active in vinyl toys
and created their own MARUSAN original monster series in 1970 and the
"Ultraman Ace" series of mini toys in 1972. During the 1970s,
Marusan eventually moved primarily into the OEM (Original Equipment
Manufacture) business of producing toys and parts for others as opposed
to producing original brand toys. In support of this Marusan founder, Minour Ishida died on December 3, 1987 at the age of 72 and Aiko Ishida was appointed president. The following year manufacturing was begun in China. Capitalizing on the nostalgia craze, Marusan returned to their own brand with reproductions of MARUSAN original monster series in 1997. Marusan now remains one of the old names in the Japanese toy industry. Since the 1990’s MARUSAN TOYS, INC. has been under the leadership of its’ 6th president, Eiji Kaminaga. Mr. Kaminaga continues the tradition making outstanding character toys, play tin toys or vinyl monster toys with the classic Japanese craftsmanship.
MARUSAN-USA is the American affiliate working with MARUSAN TOYS headquarters in Japan. Headed by Steve Forde, (founder/principal at GoHero.com - producers of neo-retro pop-art collectibles), MARUSAN-USA seeks to bring these amazing Japanese toys to the collectors in the United States. With the resurgence of giant monsters in film, like Godzilla and Pacific Rim, MARUSAN is excited to continue making the best in classic Japanese collectibles. Photos (from top to bottom) 1) Early Marusan Shoten Factory, circa 1950
This article and photos are provided courtesy of Marusan-USA. You can find additional information at www.marusan-usa.com |
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One
of the toy companies from Japan whose products have endured over time is
Marusan Co. Ltd. We know them by the mark of SAN in a circle as shown
above. The Japanese word "Maru" means circle, thus the mark of
SAN in a circle. But the word "San" also means three, which
refers to the 3 founders of this company in 1947. Circles along with
diamonds were popular logo marks for Japanese companies at that time as
evidenced by the many marks we see within a circle or diamond.
Initially,
their business was a wholesale sales business, but they eventually began
to design and market their own toys. Some of the items on the 1951 sales
list for Marusan included the following:
