If anyone had any doubts on how much Otaku can move the japanese economy, here’s some interesting news.

The illustration is actually a huge marketing move for the rice producers from the small town of Ugomachi (Akita Prefecture).
And it was something well planned too, since the illustration is from none other than female eroge artist Aoi Nishimata (Shuffle!, Final Approach, etc.).

Results you ask? They sold in one month, the same ammount of rice they’d previously sell in 2 years.
Given the group mostly sell their rice through mail order, their website jumped from 5 visitors a day to 5000.
In one month alone, they got 2500 orders, adding up to 30 tons worth of the 5kg and 10kg packages.

Success didn’t go unnoticed, as Aoi Nishimata was also hired to create the illustration for a box of strawberries too.

And finally, a dounjinshi circle announced that they will also be selling a different limited version of moe rice using a Touhou Character at a Touhou only event in 2009.

I can’t imagine how long the trend would hold… it’s probable that those first attempts of moefication of food packaging were only this successful because they were the first ones.
I don’t think otaku would still keep spending this much when the market is saturated by products with moe girls on the packages.

But I also see they didn’t get to the real good things yet.
Imagine, for instance, selling Choco-cornets with Konata Izumi face on it?
Or a Shana-chan melon pan?
Pocky + Mizuho hello??
Ice creams also have lots of room for eroge illustrations…
Lots of japanese sweets can make use of the trend too.

Future might not be very bright for lots of industries with the crisis, but it seems the food industry might be saved for a while….

UPDATE! Here’s a new video for those who can understand japanese about Moe Rice:

Source: SankakuComplex (NSFW) and DannyChoo.com for the update.