McFarlane Toys, founded by and named after legendary designer and artist Todd McFarlane, is praised among collectors worldwide for its highly detailed model action figures.

Since 1994, the company has created countless figures and toys in collaboration with the world’s most famous film, comics, music and video games companies.

Despite offline retail success, McFarlane lacked digitization. This limited its audience: Customers abroad can be hard to reach due to logistical constraints and the younger generation of collectors increasingly spends time online. 

Selling digital collectibles as NFTs turned out to be the best way to proceed: Blockchains make it easy to verify authenticity and remove the need to build everything in-house. Moreover, that shift also involves access to a new audience of crypto natives who are used to collecting digital assets on a regular basis.

New experiences to take collectibles onchain

To support its new direction, McFarlane Toys introduced a new online-focused division called McFarlane Digital. This new division partnered with Rarible and Polygon to kick off its web3 operations, and announced the first drop of high-quality collectible NFTs based on the company’s renowned character Spawn.

Following the initial success, the company announced a massive digital partnership with Warner Bros. This partnership has granted McFarlane Digital access to various iconic IPs from the DC Universe, and soon Batman and Superman collectibles became the most popular among the rapidly growing McFarlane Digital community.

Notably, each of McFarlane’s NFTs can be uploaded into the 3D viewer app, providing fans with a unique digital experience where they arrange and showcase their collections to the entire community.

Marketplace for primary & secondary

McFarlane Digital’s partnership with RaribleX centered around the first AAA digital collectibles platform which enables both primary and secondary sales. 

Powered by the low-gas Polygon coupled with an easy-to-use interface and the credit card checkout feature, the marketplace allow people with no web3 experience easily navigate and buy collectibles.

McFarlane Digital keeps its audience constantly engaged via regular surprise drops, distributed through the Rarible-powered marketplace. That way, fans can easily keep track of all the released NFTs, and trade items with each other to build their collections just like they did at toy fairs back in the day. 

But this time, it’s worldwide, almost instant and with proven authenticity.

The Web3 boost

McFarlane Digital’s marketplace has helped the brand add a digital revenue stream to its business model.

• Engagement: The marketplace has witnessed over 250,000 visits and 86,000 connected wallets.

• Sales velocity: Several drops on the platform sold out in under five minutes, highlighting intense demand for high-quality onchain collectibles.

• Revenue: Having hosted a total of 21 collections, the marketplace has amassed over $1,000,000 in GMV ($416,000 from primary sales; $590,000 from secondary)—a significant boost to McFarlane Toys' bottom line.

• Brand visibility: The collaboration has introduced McFarlane Toys’ product to the active collectors segment in the web3 community—and vice versa.

This collaboration showcases the remarkable potential of blending traditional brand legacies with digital innovation. Now firmly integrated into the web3 space, McFarlane has expanded its global reach, tapped into new revenue streams, and resonated with a new audience.