The Best One Piece Collaborations

On YouTube, there is a playlist of One Piece commercials from Japan through the years. It’s not just a compilation of teasers for the anime, but a journey through the various collaborations and brand deals that they have been a part of for nearly 30 years. Whether you’re here to figure out what exactly Luffy has to do with razors, grape soda, mini-vans, or back-to-school supplies, or you actually own some of these One Piece-branded items, it’s corporate synergy in action, but with enough anime whimsy to make you forget the part where you’re supposed to be buying the things on the screen.

Later this month, Nike will release their highly anticipated One Piece Air Max Plus collaboration with a staggered worldwide launch that includes preorders, regional drops, and retailer exclusives (learn more about it here). While a Nike collaboration sounds like a big deal to the sneaker world, for One Piece, it’s another box they will have checked off as they become Disney-like in their ubiquity.

What once felt like a niche pursuit for a niche audience is now another part of mainstream culture. But before One Piece settles into becoming another regular on the Macy’s Thanksgiving Day Parade alongside fellow Japanese imports like Pikachu, Goku, and Hello Kitty, the Straw Hat Crew is having a moment, and every brand wants to be a part of the ride.

Food: McDonald’s, KFC, Popeyes, Burger King

As someone who recently visited the One Piece Cafe in Little Tokyo in Los Angeles, there is no shortage of fans who want to see their fandom come to life in edible and drinkable form. For those who are unable to make the trek, One Piece has been busy working with various fast food chains to deliver a little bit of that Straw Hat Crew flavor. McDonald’s is grabbing the spotlight at the moment thanks to their upcoming One Piece crossover collab that also includes SpongeBob SquarePants. However, we have seen them work together before as McDonald’s Japan even recreated the anime’s first intro sequence complete with Chicken Tasuta sandwiches.

Popeyes collaboration with One Piece dropped earlier this year with special menu items and merchandise, with fans flocking on launch day to pick up a physical bento box at one of six locations across the country. Other fast food collabs include KFC Taiwan and their viral Devil Fruit Sea and Land Castle Burger, which includes fried boneless chicken thighs, a shrimp patty, and crab sauce, while Burger King celebrated the live-action Netflix show with branded food and a Going Merry paper boat that housed your meal across Europe and Asia.

Luxury and Lifestyle Brands: Gucci, Lacoste, Uniqlo

When Gucci announced a collaboration with One Piece, it sadly didn’t go beyond manga creator Eiichiro Oda drawing Monkey D. Luffy and Roronoa Zoro wearing pieces from their Fall/Winter 2020 collection. Thankfully there’s no shortage of fun One Piece collabs clothing brands through the years that are a step up from your silk shirts with all over print of the Straw Hat Crew.

Uniqlo has worked regularly with One Piece through the years, dropping a new T-shirt collection right around the time you start thinking it’s been a while since Uniqlo had One Piece T-shirts. Lacoste’s collab with One Piece, which featured a very clever interpretation of the iconic alligator logo, was led by model and actress Anna Ishii. During the promotion of the collab, Ishii mentioned that her parents were One Piece fans who transferred their love of the franchise to her. And so goes the inevitable passage of time, except if you’re Luffy and company, who are over nearly 1,200 episodes in and still out there trying to find the One Piece.

Watches: Tag Heuer, Seiko, Casio

One Piece watch collaborations are relatively common in Japan, with pieces ranging from $50 that most fans will be able to afford all the way up to the luxury makers that are as much investment pieces as they are fan swag. With trading cards featuring One Piece and Pokémon now catching the attention of the one-percenters, it would not be shocking to see them turn their eyes to the handful of top collabs from the past several years.

While it’s not particularly shocking to see Seiko and G-Shock maker Casio work on One Piece watches, the Tag Heuer collab from 2016 is an outlier. Limited to 250 pieces for the quartz model and 1,000 pieces of the Calibre 5 “Phantom” edition, the Aquaracer stands as the brand’s sole collab with an anime and manga property. Hopefully there will be more in the future as the genre’s hold on mainstream culture is not letting up anytime soon.

LEGO: Sets Based on the Live-Action Netflix Series

To truly understand how special One Piece is, they have managed to do the impossible: make a live-action adaptation of a beloved anime and manga series that doesn’t want to make fans crawl into a shell from embarrassment. After trying and failing miserably with classic shows like Cowboy Bebop and Death Note, Netflix has gradually improved through the years with noteworthy takes on Yu Yu Hakusho and Avatar: The Last Airbender, although the latter is technically not anime by definition.

And it’s a good thing the show is well-received because the LEGO sets based on season 1 would have been a very awkward purchase for fans if things had gone sideways. Season 2 follows up with new sets that arrived this past August based on Tony Tony Chopper, Garp’s Marine Battleship, and the super-sized battle between giants Dorry and Brogy. If I had the free time to mess around with one of the sets, The Going Merry would be at the top of the list. And in perhaps the biggest sign that Netflix was successful in its adaptation, there will be a LEGO One Piece special in the great tradition of LEGO send-ups like LEGO Batman and LEGO Star Wars.

Sports: Los Angeles Dodgers, Borussia Dortmund, Los Angeles Rams, Los Angeles Lakers. Samurai Blue

25 years ago, the idea of an American sports team collaborating with a popular Japanese manga and anime franchise would have been laughable as most would assume that there is no crossover opportunity between the two worlds. It would take properties like One Piece, Dragon Ball, and Demon Slayer to prove that not only are they popular stateside, but they can introduce their fans to the wide world of sports to create new supporters. Well, it’s either that or the teams entice them with really cool collab merch and hope they stay for the actual game.

While the Rams and Lakers provided the fans in attendance with cool merch that they wear or use, the Dodgers and Borussia Dortmund not only provided the merch, but they also opened the floodgates by giving them free collectible trading cards. For the past two years, One Piece Night at Dodger Stadium has been a mega hit for fans of the franchise and collectors looking for a cool card to resell to the highest bidder keep in their collection.

Last year’s One Piece Dodgers card featuring Luffy sells for over a thousand dollars in ungraded form, with this year’s edition not too far behind at around $800 a pop. Borussia Dortmund of the Bundesliga, Germany’s top soccer football league, also provided fans with a free promo card of Luffy wearing their kit. While not as desired as the two Dodgers cards, the Dortmund card could become an underrated favorite over time.

Anime Crossovers: Jump Stars

Weekly Shōnen Jump is a weekly (naturally) series of manga that features some of the most iconic properties of the entire genre, including One Piece, Dragon Ball, Naruto, Demon Slayer, and Slam Dunk, which received an Air Jordan collaboration over a decade ago. While their stories very rarely crossover in the pages of the magazine, it’s not uncommon to see them collaborate on special cover art, merchandise, and non-canon episodes of their respective anime series. But if you ever wanted to see what would happen if Vegeta and Roronoa Zero faced off, the Jump Stars video game franchise is just for you. Since 1989, when Famicom Jump debuted on the Japanese version of the NES called The Family Computer, the stars of Shōnen Jump have been duking it out to see who is the best of the best.

Sneakers: Nike, Gucci, Crocs, Vans

We recently did a whole list of One Piece’s history of sneaker collaborations. Check them out here.

Wedding Dresses: Placole

No, seriously. The collaboration kicked off back in August 2020 with artwork featuring one character from the show in a wedding dress designed by Placole debuting at the start of each month. Beginning with Nami (of course) and ending with Charlotte Lin Lin (of course), each dress was a reflection of their respective character’s style and personality. Fans who actually wanted to wear the dresses down the aisle on their special day were able to order Nami, Vivi, Perhona, or Nico Robin’s designs for a limited time.

Eyedrops: Santen

Everything can be a collab, even eyedrops. Featuring the main cast, including Luffy, Nami, Roronoa Zoro, Brook, Nico Robin, Tony Tony Chopper, and the rest of the Straw Hat Crew, they each hold a Santen eye drop product in their hand as the commercial declares, "[l]et's see what we have never seen before." The first two eye drops in the collab featured Luffy and Trafalgar D. Water Law.

Lingerie: Peach John

Honestly? The least surprising collaboration on this list. Peach John is a lingerie and loungewear brand that caters to a younger audience that would be into properties like One Piece, Sailor Moon, and Neon Genesis Evangelion. Along with the lingerie and swimwear pieces inspired by Nami, Hancock, and Nico Robin, there’s casual bedtime wear, including pajamas for Luffy, slip-ons for Chopper, and whatever it is they made for Bon Clay.

Juan Martinez

From video game journalism to veteran of the sneaker blog era to podcasting about well, everything, Juan is smiling through it all and can't believe this is his life. His current hot take is that people are really underrating the Psyduck trading card market. Email: juan@soleretriever.com Instagram | Twitter | Bluesky : @ezyville