When I received my Ayupans today, I kind of liked not knowing which ones they were until I opened the packaging. It would be awesome if we could pick which ones we wanted to buy so we wouldn't have to worry about getting duplicates. But at the same time, it's great that we can sell and trade our extras here with other members.

I second this, not knowing which one you're going to get is sort of fun but when you have duplicates (or not the one you want) it's frustrating =(

I used to collect ayupans. I began when she released them in Family Marts around the country back in 2002. My most prized are the T.A. Live Tour ones.
I've stopped collecting them mainly because I'm unable to log into Mu-mo when they're put on sale. They get sold-out in a matter of minutes!! I'm tempted to buy some this year though... we'll see.
And my advice for collectors is to be patient. Wait a few years (yes, that's right) and the ayupans you want might be on sale for a reasonable price on Yahoo Auctions JP.

I'll definetely have to check out Yahoo Auctions JP because I've heard quite a few people talk about getting their Ayupans there. Do the sellers ship outside of Japan?

most of them do not send to outside japan .you need to use middleman services like celga,japan auction agency etc

^^I use Shopping Mall Japan. Their rate is pretty fair.

But otherwise yeah, you're probably gonig to need a middle man to bid off there. Great deals though so it's worth it most of the time.

Do most of you collect by sets or just buy the ones you like?

I started with the ones I liked first, like A MUSEUM and (miss)understood CD ones, then started collecting others I didn't even like. Now I have all the numbered Ayupans I collect them as they're released.

I think that's a wonderful idea to collect that way. At one point, I was just collecting them as I saw them but I realized that I needed to have some kind of structure as to how I'm going to collect them since there are so many.

yeah, its overwhelming at first, there's so many out there, but some will appeal to you more than others, so I suggest starting with those, then working your way down to any you may not be so fond of.

Some of the ayupans I really do not like at all are:

#8, #19, #22 (mainly because it always falls off my shelf, so I call it my Kamikaze Ayupan), 47 (cos it cost me an arm and a leg and it's not even a real costume from anything!), #87 (jailbird Ayu?)

I have a question about those Ayupans~
Do they have 2 designs, like one smiles and one doesn't cause there are always 2 pictures~

No most of them have sad faces, there are only a few (since AT06 I think) that are smiling.
The reason you always see a smile version on eneabba is that nick made them all smile^^

I wonder why they decided to give the Ayupans more sad faces than happy faces. I don't know if they were supposed to come across as serious expressions and ended up looking sad. It's not very fitting of Ayu as she is always smiling when I see her, lol.

I want to collect 1 entire set (m)u ones, but for the others I just buy the ones I like ^_^