• Raine Lovebright, founder of Beenleigh shop, Let's Go Akamaru!, in the City of Logan.
Arts + Culture, Movers + Shakers, People of LoganMarch 30, 2022 / 4 minute read

Anime culture comes to Logan

A Beenleigh shop run by a small and passionate team is becoming the heart of anime culture in Logan after its their first ever event drew thousands of fans to the Beenleigh Events Centre. 

AKACON, held in early March, attracted 2,000 anime fans – not a bad run when CEO Raine Lovebrights says they were hoping for 800 visitors. 

‘It was great, and we are hoping to get bigger and better with these events. We plan on holding 2 per a year,’ she says. 

She says the appeal of anime is universal – and the art form has seen a massive rise in popularity in recent years. 

‘I think there has been a cultural shift as we move into embracing differences, being nerds, and not following the status quo or mainstream pop culture as much,’ she says. 

‘People talk to each other online about what they are interested in and with anime, there has been a real grassroots movement through chat rooms like Discord and other online communities. It is because of these communities that we were able to hold AKACON, a big event with lots of vendors and performers, without having much experience in events in the past. We used social media and people really wanted to be involved.’ 

“I think there has been a cultural shift as we move into embracing differences, being nerds, and not following the status quo”

— Raine

Let’s Go Akamaru has an online following of more than 410,000 people, and, while it has a physical store in Beenleigh, the team conducts most business through its online store and, soon, through regular events. 

Raine says the attendees who responded to the feedback surveys at AKACON overwhelmingly said they would return – 97 per cent of people – and just had one suggestion for improvement: that it be bigger next time. 

‘We are hoping that the next event will run over 2 days,’ Raine says, adding that one event eachr year will be at Logan Entertainment Centre while, the other will remain at Beenleigh Events Centre. 

‘We love Beenleigh. I, it’ is where we started and we have had great support from Council and from the community here too – so it’s important that one of our annual events stay here,’ says RaineRaine says. 

AKACON will be returning in October – check out event details here.

Let’s Go Akamaru’s website is here: Let’s Go Akamaru! (letsgoakamaru.com.au) 

You can find them on Facebook here, TikTok here and Instagram here.

By Sharon Worboys

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