Hiya Toys Interview

SDCC 2024

July 28, 2024

Angelo Cheng: Chief Marketing Officer.

Interview prepared by The Articulation Series

Interviewed by Chris Mirjahangir (Toho Kingdom)

 

 

Hiya Toys is an international e-commerce company. We mainly stock a wide range of excellent figures. We are committed to bringing our customers the very latest and most creative products. We have very strict quality control of our products to ensure that our customers could receive unique high-quality products. At the same time, we have a very professional customer service team with more than 4 people to provide customers with after-sales service.

 

Note from Chris: The following is a joint interview with myself and site contributor Michal Shipman with Chief Marketing Officer, Angelo Cheng from Hiya toys. It was conducted on the show floor at San Diego Comic Con 2024. In addition, although there are finished and painted promotional releases of Shimo, Godzilla 2000, and Godzilla 2001 out there, I thought it might be fun to include shots of the earlier work in progress sculpts. Thank you Angelo for taking them out of the case for me!

 

CHRIS: Do you mind sharing a little about Hiya Toys for those who don’t know?

 

ANGELO: I'm Angelo from Hiya Toys and we’ve been producing collectible figures into the market since 2013. Last year we had very exciting things to announce, including Godzilla, at SDCC. We’ve received a lot of good feedback since and hopefully we can continue with this momentum moving forward to bring you more product and continue expanding properties into our catalog.

 

CHRIS: What inspired Hiya Toys to start working with the Godzilla franchise?

 

ANGELO: We love it! The CEO, the designer, the team; all of us are passionate fans and we hope you can see that in our product.

 

CHRIS: What is it like working with Toho?

 

ANGELO: We’ve developed a very good relationship with Toho & Legendary and hope to continue it to bring fans the product they’re asking for.

 

CHRIS: What is Hiya Toys’ goal with the Godzilla franchise? Do you plan on making collectibles for years and years or just for a short while due to licensing?

 

ANGELO: For the Godzilla franchise, we would hope it’s for the long term because we have proven a success with our Godzilla figures in the market. Continued success will help us drive towards the next three, five, even ten years or more. To elaborate, some properties can last long term or short term. For Godzilla, it’s very promising.

 

CHRIS: Currently there are two lines for Godzilla within Hiya Toys: Exquisite Basic and Stylist. Are there any others in the works?

 

ANGELO: Not for Godzilla, no sorry.

 

CHRIS: Up until recently, Hiya Toys Godzilla line has been known for Legendary/MonsterVerse products. Now we’re seeing Heisei and some Millennium on display here at SDCC. What other eras of Godzilla are you able to do? Specifically, are you able to do Showa & Reiwa?

 

ANGELO: So, we have almost all of the properties from Toho and Legendary. The process in acquiring them is done step by step. At this time, we are focusing on all of the Godzilla figures that are presented here at SDCC and later on, step by step, we will try our best to bring new figures of the Godzilla franchise into the market. Right now, we can’t say what eras are confirmed, but we promise you that more items are on the way.

 

CHRIS: Are you open to doing video game characters from the Godzilla franchise like Super Godzilla or Bagan?

 

ANGELO: Possibly… right now, our product plan is still focusing on the what’s seen in the movies. We would like to get to make figures from new movies like Godzilla: Singular Point and Godzilla Minus One. These are in our plan and once we’re able to do those, we can talk later about Super Godzilla & Bagan. If there are other characters you’d like to see, we would also like to know more about them.

 

CHRIS: Do you see your fan feedback and how do you implement that? 

 

ANGELO: We regularly check fan feedback through social channels like X, Facebook, and Instagram. A lot of what we see is what they would like to see in the future, which is good, but we also look for criticisms as well. It’s all good feedback for us to improve and plan looking into the future. We hope to make our fans dreams come true.  

 

CHRIS: Are there plans to implement features like LED our Sound Effects in future release?

 

ANGELO: Yes. On display, we have the Heat Ray Godzilla Ultimate Version, from Godzilla vs. Kong (2021), that will have LED. However, I’m sorry to say that at this moment it’s just in the prototype phase with no LED in it. We hope to show you more in the future!

 

CHRIS: When Hiya Toys announced it was making Godzilla figures it teased an image with MonsterVerse characters. All have been made except for Mechagodzilla. Is it still on the way?

 

ANGELO: Maybe… Maybe… Haha.

 

CHRIS: Could we see characters from the MonsterVerse comics appear as action figures?

 

ANGELO: I think right now, we have what we have in terms of the MonsterVerse.

 

CHRIS: What kind of attention between MonsterVerse and Classic Toho will you be putting out moving forward?

 

ANGELO: It’s very difficult to say. It’s not straight forward like 50/50 or whatever. What we do is we have our product plan and test the market with said product. If this product is good or not, then we will decide to move forward or not. So, it’s not so clear cut. It really depends on the market.

 

CHRIS: Do you have anything you’d like to share with the fans? What to expect in the future or any hints as to what's to come beyond what's been revealed at SDCC?

 

ANGELO: SDCC is really important to us. Besides all of the product we present here, we want to get more people interested in our brand. If there are other properties you are interested in, we invite you to continue sharing your feedback on our social media. Hopefully, in the future, we can acquire these requested properties and produce high quality products that the fans want. Thank you!

 

 

WWW.HIYATOYS.COM

INSTAGRAM

FACEBOOK

X

 

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"The Articulation Series" is independent of Hiya Toys. Though independent, "The Articulation Series" has a working relationship with these entities covering Hiya Toys Exquisite Basic Series related news & media.


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© The Articulation Series 2024. All Rights Reserved.

Hiya Toys Interview

SDCC 2024

July 28, 2024

Angelo Cheng: Chief Marketing Officer.

Interview prepared by The Articulation Series

Interviewed by Chris Mirjahangir (Toho Kingdom)

 

 

​

Hiya Toys is an international e-commerce company. We mainly stock a wide range of excellent figures. We are committed to bringing our customers the very latest and most creative products. We have very strict quality control of our products to ensure that our customers could receive unique high-quality products. At the same time, we have a very professional customer service team with more than 4 people to provide customers with after-sales service.

 

Note from Chris: The following is a joint interview with myself and site contributor Michal Shipman with Chief Marketing Officer, Angelo Cheng from Hiya toys. It was conducted on the show floor at San Diego Comic Con 2024. In addition, although there are finished and painted promotional releases of Shimo, Godzilla 2000, and Godzilla 2001 out there, I thought it might be fun to include shots of the earlier work in progress sculpts. Thank you Angelo for taking them out of the case for me!

 

CHRIS: Do you mind sharing a little about Hiya Toys for those who don’t know?

 

ANGELO: I'm Angelo from Hiya Toys and we’ve been producing collectible figures into the market since 2013. Last year we had very exciting things to announce, including Godzilla, at SDCC. We’ve received a lot of good feedback since and hopefully we can continue with this momentum moving forward to bring you more product and continue expanding properties into our catalog.

 

CHRIS: What inspired Hiya Toys to start working with the Godzilla franchise?

 

ANGELO: We love it! The CEO, the designer, the team; all of us are passionate fans and we hope you can see that in our product.

 

CHRIS: What is it like working with Toho?

 

ANGELO: We’ve developed a very good relationship with Toho & Legendary and hope to continue it to bring fans the product they’re asking for.

 

CHRIS: What is Hiya Toys’ goal with the Godzilla franchise? Do you plan on making collectibles for years and years or just for a short while due to licensing?

 

ANGELO: For the Godzilla franchise, we would hope it’s for the long term because we have proven a success with our Godzilla figures in the market. Continued success will help us drive towards the next three, five, even ten years or more. To elaborate, some properties can last long term or short term. For Godzilla, it’s very promising.

 

CHRIS: Currently there are two lines for Godzilla within Hiya Toys: Exquisite Basic and Stylist. Are there any others in the works?

 

​

ANGELO: Not for Godzilla, no sorry.

 

CHRIS: Up until recently, Hiya Toys Godzilla line has been known for Legendary/MonsterVerse products. Now we’re seeing Heisei and some Millennium on display here at SDCC. What other eras of Godzilla are you able to do? Specifically, are you able to do Showa & Reiwa?

 

ANGELO: So, we have almost all of the properties from Toho and Legendary. The process in acquiring them is done step by step. At this time, we are focusing on all of the Godzilla figures that are presented here at SDCC and later on, step by step, we will try our best to bring new figures of the Godzilla franchise into the market. Right now, we can’t say what eras are confirmed, but we promise you that more items are on the way.

 

CHRIS: Are you open to doing video game characters from the Godzilla franchise like Super Godzilla or Bagan?

 

ANGELO: Possibly… right now, our product plan is still focusing on the what’s seen in the movies. We would like to get to make figures from new movies like Godzilla: Singular Point and Godzilla Minus One. These are in our plan and once we’re able to do those, we can talk later about Super Godzilla & Bagan. If there are other characters you’d like to see, we would also like to know more about them.

 

CHRIS: Do you see your fan feedback and how do you implement that?

 

​

ANGELO: We regularly check fan feedback through social channels like X, Facebook, and Instagram. A lot of what we see is what they would like to see in the future, which is good, but we also look for criticisms as well. It’s all good feedback for us to improve and plan looking into the future. We hope to make our fans dreams come true.   \

 

CHRIS: Are there plans to implement features like LED our Sound Effects in future release?

 

ANGELO: Yes. On display, we have the Heat Ray Godzilla Ultimate Version, from Godzilla vs. Kong (2021), that will have LED. However, I’m sorry to say that at this moment it’s just in the prototype phase with no LED in it. We hope to show you more in the future!

 

CHRIS: When Hiya Toys announced it was making Godzilla figures it teased an image with MonsterVerse characters. All have been made except for Mechagodzilla. Is it still on the way?

 

ANGELO: Maybe… Maybe… Haha.

​

CHRIS: Could we see characters from the MonsterVerse comics appear as action figures?

 

ANGELO: I think right now, we have what we have in terms of the MonsterVerse.

 

CHRIS: What kind of attention between MonsterVerse and Classic Toho will you be putting out moving forward?

 

ANGELO: It’s very difficult to say. It’s not straight forward like 50/50 or whatever. What we do is we have our product plan and test the market with said product. If this product is good or not, then we will decide to move forward or not. So, it’s not so clear cut. It really depends on the market.

 

CHRIS: Do you have anything you’d like to share with the fans? What to expect in the future or any hints as to what's to come beyond what's been revealed at SDCC?

 

ANGELO: SDCC is really important to us. Besides all of the product we present here, we want to get more people interested in our brand. If there are other properties you are interested in, we invite you to continue sharing your feedback on our social media. Hopefully, in the future, we can acquire these requested properties and produce high quality products that the fans want. Thank you!

 

 

WWW.HIYATOYS.COM

INSTAGRAM

FACEBOOK

X