Interest

Sazae-san Anime Regains Corporate Sponsors to End 11-Week Drought

Anime News Network's Japan-based staff confirmed the April 6 episode of Sazae-san aired with two corporate sponsors, Geo and OIC Group. This is the first time that the long-running anime had corporate sponsors in nine weeks. (Some sponsors already began removing their ads a couple of weeks earlier in late January.) ANN confirmed this past Sunday's episode aired Geo and OIC Group commercials along with commercials for Fuji TV productions and non-profit public service announcements from AC Japan. The Fuji TV productions included the new drama series Hitomi no Jinji and Zoku Zoku Saigokara Nibanme no Koi, and feature-length films Ya Boy Kongming! the Movie and Black Showman.

Other anime series airing on Fuji TV are still struggling to gain corporate sponsors, even with the start of the spring season. Fuji TV stalwart Chibi Maruko-chan was without corporate sponsors for a third week after the cram school chain Kobetsu Shidō Campus pulled its commercials on March 16. The cram school brand sponsored Chibi Maruko-chan for five weeks between February 15 to March 16. However, characters from the anime series are still appearing in commercials for the Japanese thrift store chain Buy Sell, separate from the anime's Fuji TV broadcasts. The characters also began appearing in live-action ads set 20 years later for SUNTORY's Premium Malt's beer brand in February.

GeGeGe no Kitarō Watashi no Aishita Rekidai Gegege, a rerun of selected GeGeGe no Kitarō episodes from that anime's 60-year history, inherited Bandai and Bandai Namco Entertainment as corporate sponsors from Tousouchu: The Great Mission.

The Dinner Table Detective, To Be Hero X, and One Piece aired with partial sponsorships; the first half of the programs had corporate sponsors, but the second half did not. Sponsors include Sony Music and Aniplex for The Dinner Table Detective, Sony Music, Aniplex, and Bandai for To Be Hero X, and Bandai and Bandai Namco Entertainment for One Piece.

New anime series The Beginning After The End aired with no corporate sponsors despite Honey Lemon Soda, which aired in the same timeslot during the Winter 2025 season, retaining mobile game producer Grams as a corporate sponsor for the entirety of the Winter 2025 season.

New Chinese animated series Don't Give Up also aired without any corporate sponsorships. However, the series it replaced, another Chinese animation production, Ringing Fate, also had no corporate sponsors during the Winter 2025 season.

Gegege no Kitaro Watashi no Aishita Rekidai Gegege and One Piece were the only series to retain corporate sponsors going into the Spring 2025 season. Similarly, The Dinner Table Detective and To Be Hero X were the only new series to receive corporate sponsorships.

Several other ads for events and other products aired in conjunction with the sponsored ads. As these ads were not sponsoring any anime aired on Fuji TV, they were likely part of the broadcaster's general sponsorship pool.

Fuji TV's sponsorship drought came after the Weekly Bunshun magazine reported former SMAP member Masahiro Nakai engaged in nonconsensual sexual activities with a woman in June 2023, resulting in a 90 million yen (about US$580,000) out-of-court settlement. Weekly Bunshun also reported Fuji TV staff was involved with the incident, although the magazine later said the woman was not initially invited to the gathering by a Fuji TV official as it had reported in December. In the aftermath, Fuji TV president Koichi Minato and Fuji Media Holdings Inc. chairman Shuji Kano resigned their positions.

As of press time, no announcements have been made regarding future sponsorships for anime programming on Fuji TV.