How Japanese Lottery (Chusen) Drops & Resale Markups Work

Medicom Toy releases most of its highest-demand figures through a Japanese lottery system called chusen (抽選), a raffle-style allocation in which collectors submit an entry during a fixed window and only randomly drawn winners earn the right to purchase at retail price. Rather than selling coveted BE@RBRICK, KAWS, and collaboration pieces first-come-first-served, Medicom and its retail partners cap demand fairly, remove the advantage of bots and queue-jumping, and let the secondary market absorb the difference between limited supply and outsized demand. The practical result: the retail sticker is only the entry ticket, and the price a non-winner actually pays is set later, on the resale market, often at a substantial multiple.

For collectors outside Japan, understanding this model is the difference between chasing a figure blindly and buying it intelligently. This guide explains how Medicom's release methods work end to end — the lottery mechanics, the entry windows, the winner's purchase rights, and the way all of it drives secondary markups — so you can decide when to enter a lottery, when to buy at retail elsewhere, and when to simply buy authenticated on the secondary market and skip the gamble entirely.

Why Medicom uses lotteries instead of first-come sales

Medicom Toy, the Tokyo-based company behind BE@RBRICK and the manufacturer of many KAWS vinyl and collaboration figures, faces a structural problem common to hype-driven collectibles: demand for a limited release routinely exceeds supply by an order of magnitude. A straightforward "on sale at 10:00 a.m." drop rewards whoever has the fastest connection, the most browser tabs, or the best bots — not the most committed collectors. It also concentrates inventory in the hands of resellers who automate checkout.

A lottery, or chusen, rebalances that. Every eligible entrant has an equal, random chance regardless of connection speed or technical sophistication. It smooths server load, discourages bulk botting (since one identity typically equals one entry), and — importantly for Medicom's brand — keeps the release feeling curated and fair rather than chaotic. The trade-off is that most people who want the figure will not win, which is precisely what creates the pent-up demand that flows into the secondary market.

Not every Medicom release uses a lottery. The company and its partners use several allocation methods, and knowing which applies to a given figure tells you a great deal about how hard it will be to acquire and how large the eventual markup is likely to be.

Medicom's common release methods at a glance

The takeaway is simple: lotteries, live first-come drops, and store-exclusives concentrate demand into a moment or a place, and that concentration is what markups feed on. Standard retail lines rarely trade far above sticker because supply is not artificially throttled. When you evaluate a BE@RBRICK collaboration or a KAWS figure, the first question is always how was this allocated? If you want a deeper breakdown of assortment ratios and pull odds specifically, our companion piece on Medicom BE@RBRICK series numbers and blind-box odds covers the sealed-case side of the equation.

How a chusen lottery actually works, step by step

Lottery mechanics vary by retailer and region, but the core sequence is consistent across most Medicom and partner-run chusen. Here is the typical lifecycle of a single lottery drop, from announcement to fulfillment.

1. Announcement. Medicom or an authorized retailer (a department store, a select boutique, or an official webstore) publishes the figure, its price, the edition or production details available, and the lottery schedule. This is where you learn the entry window dates and eligibility rules.
2. Account and eligibility setup. Most lotteries require a registered account with the retailer, sometimes with a verified Japanese address, phone number, or membership. Some limit entries to residents of a country or members of a loyalty program. This step is where overseas collectors most often hit a wall and turn to proxies.
3. Entry window opens. During a defined period — often a few days rather than a single instant — eligible collectors submit an entry for the figure they want. Crucially, entering early confers no advantage; a raffle drawn at random treats the first and last entries identically. This is the design feature that neutralizes bots and speed.
4. Entry window closes. Submissions stop. In many systems you may enter only once per figure per account, and duplicate or suspicious entries are voided.
5. The draw. The retailer randomly selects winners up to the available quantity. There is no partial credit and no waitlist priority for losing — you either won the right to buy or you did not.
6. Winner notification. Winners are notified, usually by email or in-account message, with a deadline to complete the purchase. Winning the lottery is a right to purchase, not an automatic charge; you still have to pay within the window.
7. Payment and purchase. The winner pays the retail price plus any tax and shipping. Missing the payment deadline typically forfeits the allocation, and it may or may not be re-offered to another entrant.
8. Fulfillment. The figure ships or becomes available for pickup. From this point the collector holds a legitimately retail-acquired piece — the strongest possible provenance position, because there is a clean chain from official retailer to first owner.

Two features of this cycle drive everything downstream. First, the right to purchase is non-transferable in principle — you cannot legitimately "sell your lottery slot," only the figure once you own it. Second, the number of winners is capped at supply, so if 20,000 people enter for 2,000 units, roughly 18,000 motivated buyers walk away empty-handed. Those 18,000 are the demand that the resale market must satisfy, and they will pay more than retail to do it.

From entry window to markup: the economics of the aftermarket

The markup on a lottery-allocated figure is not arbitrary. It is a fairly direct function of the gap between how many people wanted it and how many could get it, adjusted for how desirable the specific figure is and how the broader market is behaving at that moment. A useful way to think about it:

• Entry-to-supply ratio. The more entries per available unit, the deeper the pool of losing bidders competing on resale. A 10:1 ratio produces more upward pressure than a 2:1 ratio, all else equal.
• Desirability of the specific piece. A marquee collaboration, a beloved character, an unusual finish (chrome, flocked, transparent), or a large 1000% BE@RBRICK size command more than a plain colorway. Collaboration equity matters enormously — some partnerships hold value for years, others fade fast.
• Condition and completeness. Sealed, unopened, with all original packaging and inserts intact almost always trades above an opened or displayed example. For designer toys, the box is part of the object.
• Timing and market mood. Markups are highest immediately after a sell-out, when losing entrants are most eager, and can soften over weeks or months as supply from winners seeps onto the market and urgency cools.

Because these variables move, resale prices are a range, not a fixed number. A newly dropped, heavily oversubscribed collaboration can trade at a large multiple of retail in its first days, then settle. A more modest release may hover near retail. This is why we caution collectors against treating any single sold listing as "the price." For guidance on which collaborations tend to sustain their premiums versus which give them back, see our analysis of BE@RBRICK collaborations that hold value.

A worked example of the demand cascade

Consider a hypothetical 400% and 1000% BE@RBRICK set released by lottery through a Japanese retailer. Suppose the 1000% is capped at a few thousand units and the entry window draws many times that in submissions. The sequence typically unfolds like this:

1. The lottery closes and winners are drawn. A small fraction of entrants win the right to buy.
2. Winners pay retail. Some intend to keep the figure; others entered specifically to flip it.
3. Within days, flip-minded winners list sealed examples on secondary marketplaces — Japanese platforms, global marketplaces, and specialist dealers.
4. Thousands of losing entrants, plus collectors who never had Japanese-account access, bid those listings up. Early prices reflect peak urgency.
5. As more winners decide to sell and supply trickles out, the curve often flattens. Rare, condition-perfect, or especially desirable variants hold their premium; ordinary examples may drift closer to a stable secondary level.

The figure to remember is not a specific dollar amount — those change constantly and vary by piece — but the shape: a spike at release driven by unfilled lottery demand, followed by a settling period. Buying at the very peak is the most expensive moment; buying a legitimately authenticated piece after the initial frenzy, or from a dealer who already vetted it, is usually the sounder play.

The proxy and overseas-buyer problem

Most chusen are structured for the Japanese domestic market. Entry may require a Japanese address, a domestic phone number, a local payment method, or membership in a retailer's program. For collectors outside Japan, this creates three realistic paths to a lottery-allocated figure:

• Enter via a proxy or forwarding service. A Japan-based proxy can, in some cases, register and enter on your behalf, then forward the figure if you win. This adds service fees, forwarding shipping, and potential customs duties, and it only works where a retailer's terms permit third-party entry.
• Buy from a winner on the secondary market. The most common route for overseas collectors: skip the lottery entirely and purchase an already-won, authenticated example. You pay the markup but gain certainty and speed.
• Buy from a vetted dealer. A specialist gallery or dealer sources legitimately released examples, confirms condition and authenticity, and stands behind the piece. You pay for that diligence, but you avoid both the lottery gamble and the risks of an anonymous marketplace seller.

Each path has cost and risk trade-offs. Proxies are cheapest if you win but involve fees and no guarantee of winning. Anonymous secondary purchases are fast but carry authentication and condition risk. Dealer purchases cost more but transfer the diligence burden to a party with expertise and a reputation to protect. We break the proxy route down in detail — services, fees, and authentication checkpoints — in buying designer toys from Japan: proxies, fees, and authentication.

Why authentication matters more once markups appear

The moment a figure trades above retail, it becomes worth counterfeiting. High-markup, lottery-allocated BE@RBRICK and KAWS pieces are among the most faked designer toys precisely because the spread between a fake's production cost and a genuine piece's resale price is so large. That makes authentication non-negotiable on any secondary purchase.

For BE@RBRICK and KAWS figures, genuine examples are identified through Medicom's packaging, printing quality, foot stamps and series markings, and the overall fit and finish that mass-market counterfeits struggle to match. No manufacturer issues a paper "certificate of authenticity" for these toys the way a print artist might — authenticity is established by the object and its packaging, supported by provenance. At Gauntlet Gallery, applicable BE@RBRICK and KAWS pieces are backed by TrueCOA, our house authentication program, which pairs expert verification with NFC tags so a buyer can confirm a specific piece's record. Treat TrueCOA as our gallery standard, not a universal industry body — the underlying authentication still rests on Medicom's markings and a clean provenance chain.

Practical authentication discipline for a lottery-era figure comes down to a few habits:

• Insist on the full package. Original box, inserts, seals, and any hologram or series stamp should be present and consistent with a genuine release.
• Scrutinize print and finish. Fakes often reveal themselves in soft printing, off colors, sloppy seams, or incorrect stamp placement.
• Demand provenance for high-value pieces. A credible chain from a legitimate retail win to the current seller is worth paying for.
• Prefer verified pieces. An NFC-tagged, dealer-authenticated example removes most of the guesswork, especially at higher markups.

Our BE@RBRICK buyer's guide walks through the packaging and marking checks in depth, and the broader trust framework — how we vet, tag, and stand behind everything we sell — lives on our collector trust hub.

Should you enter the lottery, buy at retail elsewhere, or buy on the secondary market?

There is no single right answer; it depends on your goals, your access, and your tolerance for both risk and cost. The framework below reflects how experienced collectors decide.

If your priority is the lowest possible cost and you have the access and patience to lose lotteries repeatedly, entering directly is the value play. If your priority is owning a specific, verified piece without gambling, buying authenticated — ideally from a dealer who has already done the authentication work — is the low-stress path. Most overseas collectors end up here, and it is a perfectly rational choice: you are paying the markup in exchange for certainty, condition assurance, and provenance.

Reading the entry window: dates, eligibility, and the fine print

The single most overlooked part of a chusen is the fine print of the entry window itself. Collectors fixate on the figure and the price and skim the rules — then miss a deadline, fail an eligibility check, or violate a one-entry-per-household clause that voids their submission. Because a lottery is only fair if the rules are enforced uniformly, retailers apply them strictly, and there is rarely an appeal for a disqualified entry. A disciplined collector treats the announcement page as a contract and reads every line before entering.

Several details recur across Medicom and partner lotteries and deserve careful attention:

• Window length and time zone. Some windows run several days; others are short. All are set in Japan Standard Time. Overseas collectors routinely miscalculate the local equivalent and either enter after the close or wait past a payment deadline. Convert every date to your own time zone the moment you read it.
• One entry per person or household. Duplicate entries, multiple accounts tied to one address or payment method, and obvious proxy-farming are commonly voided. The intent is one fair shot per collector, and systems increasingly detect and cancel attempts to game that.
• Eligibility gates. A Japanese address, a domestic phone number, a verified membership, or a minimum account age can all be prerequisites. These gates are the primary reason overseas collectors cannot enter directly and must use a proxy.
• Payment method and deadline. Winners often must pay with a specific domestic method within a tight window. Know in advance whether your payment instrument will be accepted, because discovering it will not be after you win means forfeiting the piece.
• Shipping and pickup terms. Some exclusives ship only within Japan or require in-store pickup, which again pushes overseas buyers toward forwarding services and adds cost and time.

None of these rules are hostile; they exist to keep the draw fair and to prevent a handful of resellers from vacuuming up allocations. But they are unforgiving, and a missed detail costs you the entry regardless of how much you wanted the figure. The collectors who win consistently are not luckier — they simply enter more eligible windows, correctly, over a longer period, and never lose an allocation to a preventable administrative mistake.

The provenance advantage of a legitimate retail win

There is a quiet benefit to acquiring a figure through the lottery that goes beyond paying retail: provenance. A piece won directly from an authorized retailer has the cleanest possible ownership history — official retailer to first owner, with the purchase record to prove it. That clean chain matters when you eventually sell, because a buyer paying a markup wants confidence that the piece is genuine and legitimately sourced. Retail-win provenance, sealed packaging, and a documented purchase together form the strongest position a designer-toy owner can hold, and it is worth preserving the paperwork and packaging from the moment the figure arrives.

By contrast, a figure that has passed through several anonymous hands on the secondary market carries thinner provenance, which is exactly why third-party authentication and verification programs matter more as markups rise. When you cannot document a clean chain, the object's own evidence — packaging, markings, print quality — and an independent verification record have to carry the weight. This is the logic behind pairing genuine pieces with NFC-tagged records: it substitutes a durable, checkable authentication trail for a provenance chain that ordinary resale cannot supply.

Common misconceptions about Medicom lotteries

Several persistent myths lead collectors astray. Clearing them up sharpens your strategy.

• "Entering early improves my odds." In a true random draw it does not. Enter any time within the window; there is no first-mover advantage.
• "Winning means the figure is already mine." Winning is a time-limited right to buy. Miss the payment deadline and you can forfeit it.
• "The retail price is what it costs." For oversubscribed lotteries, retail is only what winners pay. Everyone else transacts at the secondary market's number.
• "All markups are permanent." Many peak at release and soften. Some collaborations hold; many ordinary colorways drift back toward a stable level.
• "A COA proves a designer toy is real." Medicom does not issue paper COAs for BE@RBRICK; authenticity rests on packaging, markings, and provenance. Verification programs like TrueCOA add a record and an NFC tag, but the object's own evidence is primary.

Putting it together: a collector's playbook

To acquire a lottery-allocated Medicom figure intelligently, work through this sequence. First, confirm the allocation method — is it chusen, a live drop, blind-box, or open retail? That single fact shapes everything. Second, if it is a lottery and you have legitimate access, enter every window you qualify for; volume of entries over time is the only lever you control. Third, if you lack access or lose, price the secondary market carefully, remembering that early post-drop listings reflect peak urgency and often soften. Fourth, on any secondary purchase, treat authentication as mandatory: full packaging, correct markings, credible provenance, and ideally a verified, NFC-tagged piece. Finally, decide honestly whether you are a keeper or a flipper, because that determines how much markup and condition risk you should accept.

Handled this way, the chusen system stops being a source of anxiety and becomes a legible market. The lottery caps supply and neutralizes bots; the markup measures unfilled demand; and authentication protects you from the counterfeiters that markups attract. Whether you win a raffle in Tokyo or buy a verified example from a dealer, the goal is the same — the right piece, genuinely what it claims to be, acquired at a price you understood going in.

Ready to browse authenticated pieces without the gamble? Explore our curated BE@RBRICK collection and KAWS collection, each vetted and, where applicable, backed by TrueCOA.