UPDATE: After publishing this article, a PR representative speaking on behalf Funko reached out to say that despite layoffs, “the poster business will continue.” Funko has yet to clarify in what capacity the Mondo posters will continue moving forwards.
Connoisseurs of custom film posters might recognize the name, Mondo. After all, the Austin, Texas-based company has been renowned for such posters ever since they got started all the way back in 2004. In fact, they literally started their business with those custom film posters. Unfortunately, that has all come to an end now. All because Funko purchased them back in June 2022.
The Execution of Mondo by Funko?
TheWrap has just announced that Funko has unfortunately laid off the vast majority of the staff at Mondo. In particular, the entire film poster division of the company got canned. The list of personnel included in these lay-offs even includes Mondo co-founders Rob Jones and Mitch Putnam. The layoffs were so sudden that even insiders aren’t sure if posters that the company was working on prior to their firing will ever see the light of day. We don’t even know if Funko will replace the poster division with their own. Even if they do though, it’s doubtful if they will ever match the quality of the original poster makers.
In fact, the only Mondo divisions left after Funko took the axe to the company are currently the toys division and the records division. Even then, insiders are also unsure how long these divisions will remain active. After all, if Funko was willing to kill the company’s biggest and most famous division, then why would they bother keeping on anything else?
Even more, unfortunately, Funko has not released any kind of official statement as to why they killed off most of Mondo. Especially not why they did so a mere 9 months after they bought the currently 19-year old company. The only clue we have comes from TheWrap, who mentions that earlier in March 2023, Funko revealed that it suffered a “loss” in Q4 2022, and that they would destroy $30-36 million USD worth of inventory and lay off a whopping 10% of its workforce as a result. This slaying of Mondo is almost certainly part of it. However, it risks making Funko look like they bought the company just to kill it. We’ll just have to see if this is indeed the case later. Tune back into THS later to get more news on this unfortunate subject if we ever do.
Source: TheWrap
