Initial D: Bunta has sold the Toyota Ipsum
June 24, 2010 in Initial D
I came accross this image on Mattari’s blog and it reminded me of the Toyota Ipsum posting I made a year ago…
Initial D replica in front of the Tofu Shop
Too bad the video has been removed now… In a nutshell: it contained another Fujiwara Tofu replica parked in front of the tofu shop and in the background a Toyota Ipsum (Picnic outside Japan) was parked next to the tofu shop on the same spot the AE86 used to be parked… So apparently Bunta has sold the Ipsum! 
Anyway, below this picture there was a whole (2chan) thread copied in which a couple of users wrote a funny Initial D spoof! I advice you to go to Mattari’s blog and read the whole story (with Google Translate for instance)! 
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I’ve always wondered. Was that shop there before the manga, or did someone decide to build a tofu shop based on the manga?
And if the first, did the tofu shop owner know about his shop being used and did he suddenly become a tofu overnight success?
Shuichi Shigeno located the manga in his hometown, Haruna, and drew several scenes from there. Also the gasstation is also an existing location.
I’m sure the tofu shop owner does know about it since his shop was already in a live-action movie remember? And of course he will get at least one fanboy visit every day:
Toyota Ipsum (picnic) next to Fujiwara Tofu shop
Picture was found here