It's the result of living in a small country with a tight-knit sense of community. No matter where you're located delivery is same day or you can jump on a train to be anywhere in a matter of minutes or at most a couple of hours. You can buy exclusive limited edition stuff easily provided you show up on time. The idols and people producing the content interact with the public more often and are expected to do as part of their job. The yen is not strong but the price of things like food, eating out and buying stuff like BDs and figures hasn't risen that much. Well figures have increased a bit but it's still within the means of someone with a low wage job. It's a shame culture that sees stealing (even through pirating) as shameful. People want to support the industry with their wallet to keep the industry pumping out content that they like. The industry hasn't pandered to much to the demands of outsiders (at least not in the domestic market although anime is getting kind of bad lately). Typically, things like anime BDs have uncensored and errors fixed in scenes compared to the broadcast/streaming version. They also include a lot of extras like interviews and extra audio tracks in episodes with seiyuus and artists. Manga is still cheap as fuck and hasn't pandered to gaijin sensibilities/censorship. Every series has an ungoldy amount of merchandise mostly limited edition/exclusive to certain stores. Things like pop-up shops and keychains.

>>105639350
They are still good for series people like. Gushing over Magical Girls sold a ton of copies before they were even stamped. Pre-orders are still used to gauge interest in another season and everyone knows it. They're still willing to buy them at those high prices for limited editions provided they aren't censored.

The real cash cow now though is other types of merchandise. Figures, pop-ups shops with cardboard cut outs and tons of trinkets and other stuff. Otaku will go without food to afford this stuff.