Crunchyroll bought Right Stuf and now it no longer sells erotic content

CrunchyrollHime is the bubbly orange mascot for the anime streaming site.

Crunchyroll announced that it has purchased Right Stuf anime merchandise retailer, as the companies revealed Thursday. The deal further consolidates Crunchyroll as a central force in the distribution of anime products, and it already sparked criticism from anime fans, since the acquisition has resulted in the removal of erotic products from Right Stuf’s storefront.

Under its new ownership, Right Stuf is “phasing out the Erotica genre content and product,” the retailer says in an FAQ on its website. The Ero Anime Store will be taking over all sales including those that were not fulfilled. That retailer will “carry the full line of the erotica content,” and customers “can look to them for current and future releases,” according to Right Stuf. As for the origins of this third party, the people behind the Ero Anime Store said in its own FAQ that the storefront’s owners “have worked with Right Stuf’s team for many years.”

However, not everyone is happy. The acquisition has immediately impacted consumers, since erotic content like hentai anime and manga is now gone from Right Stuf’s website. Jacob Grady (CEO of Fakku), the largest English publisher of hentai worldwide, is said on Twitter that the deal is a “massive blow” to his company. “Right Stuf was a big account for FAKKU and one of the only retailers that really embraced 18+ anime/manga. Not good,” Jacob said in a tweet. It’s unclear whether Fakku’s catalog will be available on Ero Anime Store.

Polygon reached out to Crunchyroll for criticisms about the deal. “We’ve worked with the Right Stuf team to ensure a smooth transition to another vendor (Ero Anime Store) who can fulfill mature content seamlessly,” a Crunchyroll representative said in a statement.

The Ero Anime Store isn’t live yet. In a statement published on the Ero Anime Store landing page, the retailer’s president — who signed off as “Wendy C” — acknowledged that the change might feel sudden, but asked customers for patience. “It may take us a bit, but we want to make sure it’s done right,” Wendy said. The site’s FAQ says that the store should be up and running “within a couple of weeks.”

Crunchyroll’s acquisition of Right Stuf has also prompted criticism regarding the streaming service’s increasing consolidation of the anime industry. Crunchyroll, which was already a major competitor to Funimation owned by Sony, merged last summer with Funimation. This further reduced the competition.

“One company, regardless of how much I like that company, should not be in control of THIS much of one product,” anime critic Kate Sánchez said on Twitter. In a separate thread later, she added, “Crunchyroll buying RightStuf is like Disney buying your local comic store and then limiting what they can sell.”