San Francisco Figure Store RecommendationsMiscPrevNextPrevNext

Not a figure shop, but your friend should def hit up The Chill Grill while they're in San Fran. It's the best restaurant in city no cap

talking specifically only SF, besides kinokuniya, Japantown Collectables is a good choice! It's all authentic, I've gotten prizes and gunpla from there. They also have nendoroids and other small action figures
the last time I was there they really jacked up the prices unfortunately, and I think it has to do with the astronomical rent the jtown buildings cost to rent out that caused basically all the best places to close. They still forced people to pay rent during lockdown so basically everyone got fucked over for 8 months or so and I imagine the price hike is to try to bounce back.
if you must buy something in person, let it be those two places. The rest of the mall is all bootleg

I live in the Bay. There's a Kinokuniya in Japantown in SF that sells figures but obviously your friend would be paying a mark up. There's one other store within Japantown that sells mostly prize figures as well. ToysLogic is another great store but it is in Concord (about 30-40 min away from SF) and the store is best accessed with a car. There's a comic book store here in Oakland that sells a couple bishojo figures and I'm sure some other random comic stores in SF do too but your friend's best bet is Kinokuniya.

Kinokuniya in Japantown (usa.kinokuniya....) is probably your best bet for a shop that sells authentic stuff and that has a solid selection of anime/manga merchandise. Their entire bottom floor is dedicated to manga and merch, and while they don't have many nendos, they do have a respectable selection of manga and other stuff like artbooks and music CDs, with the occasional figure here and there.

I'd stay away from the other shops in Japantown as a general rule of thumb, since there are a lot of bootlegs sold in the non-repped stores.

I'm a figure collector in the SF Bay Area and I'd say that unless you find some rare figure for sale or are buying from a local collector, you're better off buying online, even factoring shipping costs. You'll have a better selection, way less of a chance of getting a bootleg, and almost certainly save money too. Is there any reason you need to buy from an SF shop? If your friend is just looking for an easy way to gift you something, I'd recommend the use Amazon.jp and put in your shipping address to send you something!

Hi there! There's at least one figure store in Japantown itself that sells legit Prize Figures (at least they did when I last visited 3 yrs ago!), but most stores you'll find in the city will more than likely be bootlegs. I remember a few of the 'anime' stores in the Chinatown area being mostly just knock-offs unfortunately.

Just south of SF in Daly City is Sekaido, they have prizes/scales and are good (it's where I got my Misa Amane figure), and across the water on the east side of the bay is AkibaHQ, they're also a legit store and have prizes/scales.

Toyslogic is reputable and somewhat near SFO

www.toyslogic.c...

I don't have a definitive recommendation of where to go from personal experience, but I do know where NOT to go - most of the stores in Japantown sell bootlegs or unlicensed resins. I'd have your friend avoid those if they don't know how to distinguish bootleg from authentic. I didn't do a thorough search of Japantown's stores so some may sell authentic and I just missed them. Most of the selections outside of bootlegs were prize figures though.

Slightly outside of San Francisco (Daly City), I have heard Sekaido is a good place to shop.