Azuki Reveals 'Cute' BEANZ, Adds Former Sanrio Head as Advisor
Azuki's anime-inspired original collection, with its planned streetwear collabs, exclusive garden parties, and mission to create "dope sh*t only" has quickly gained a reputation as the cool blue-chip NFT, with a rising following — and floor price (more than 27 ETH).
Now it's clear that the cool project wants to corner the "cute" market, too.
On May 5, during the reveal of its 20,000-edition sidekick project known as Beanz, Azuki announced that former Sanrio CEO Rehito Hatoyama is joining Azuki as an advisor. Sanrio is the company behind the uber-saccharine Hello Kitty brand. Azuki rolled out lore with its BEANZ, revealing names and traits for each one of its 12 types of beans, ranging from edamame to coffee. Each type of bean has its own characteristics (Pinto BEANZ are "wacky oddballs" and Jelly BEANZ are "creatives, artists, writers, and musicians).
Just after the reveal, BEANZ holders and NFT lovers took to Twitter. One word stood out:
OMG beanz are actually cute asf
— ArinaBBart (@Arinabbart) May 5, 2022
Since being dropped to Azuki holders for free during a garden party near midnight and changing form twice, Azuki’s 20,000-edition BEANZ airdrop has grabbed people’s attention for the burgeoning, anime-inspired project.
But with a high floor (27.85 ETH) came high expectations.
Azuki next bored ape?
— DefiBrian 🍃 (Is Hiring designers and developers) (@DeFi_Brian) May 1, 2022
On April 1, the box turned into a pile of dirt, before the project announced the dirt would be BEANZ a couple of days later. During the metadata changes, the floor on the BEANZ rose from 4 ETH to more than 6.2 ETH, before settling in the 4.5-to-5.5 ETH range for a month. Since announcing the reveal date, the BEANZ floor price reached 6.8 ETH on May 4. The price went down to 5.55 ETH at 2:30 p.m. ET.
About an hour-and-a-half after the reveal, the floor has gone from 4 ETH to 4.56 ETH and the collection has done more than 3,500 ETH in volume in that time period — more importantly, sentiment on social media is high on the adorable BEANZ.
Impressed that @AzukiOfficial released a new collection that has different vibe from original, but still celebrates the same traits, lore and color pallet. The Beanz are really cute and well done. Importantly they don’t directly compete with main collection. #azuki https://t.co/8XNZLCTsIu
— Anp🅰️nMorie💀☮️ (@AnpanMorie) May 5, 2022
On April 18, Azuki released information on the BEANZ, saying the NFT could be paired with an original Azuki NFT as the “story evolves.” The project also introduced two BEANZ characters, a red bean named Toshi and a blue bean named Gus. Azuki said the BEANZ could possibly be a “canvas for future collaborations” or a collectible toy.
BEANZ holders will have access to a private Discord channel, the aforementioned collectible drops, and “more.”
