![\"\"](\"https:\/\/hawaii.carpentermediagroup.com\/midweekhawaii\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/12\/mw-122122-cover-ryan-kaji-ac-6.jpg\")
<\/p>\n<\/p>\n
Making fun YouTube videos is the family business for Ryan Kaji, star of Ryan\u2019s World, and his \u2018ohana, who have turned this practice into an entertainment empire. <\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n It\u2019s Ryan\u2019s World and oodles of children are continually glued to it \u2014 nearly 34 million subscribers at last count \u2014 as they play and learn along the way. The popular YouTube channel features 11-year-old Ryan Kaji, who along with dad Shion, mom Loann, and 6-year-old twin sisters Emma and Kate, have turned simple videos of him unboxing toys into a family-friendly entertainment empire. Collectively, their efforts have resulted in a production company that manages nine YouTube channels (which garner more than 50 million subscribers and 1 billion views per month combined), as well as a line of toys and consumer products.<\/p>\n The Kajis \u2014 from left, Emma, Ryan, Shion, Loann and Kate \u2014 moved from Houston to Honolulu in 2021 in search of better climate and community.<\/p><\/div>\n \u201cOur core principle for our brand is a combination of entertainment and education,\u201d explains Shion, noting that the target audience is keiki ages 3 to 7. \u201cWe used to focus on just entertainment, but we got so inspired by the educational part, too \u2026<\/p>\n \u201cThis is a place where we want kids to come and feel like they\u2019re on a play date with Ryan. We always look out for the authenticity, and the No. 1 priority is that Ryan is having fun in the videos.\u201d<\/p>\n These days, the fun takes place right here in Hawai\u2018i, where the Kajis have called home since April 2021. The family moved from Houston to Honolulu during the pandemic, seeking sunny skies that allowed them to be outdoors more, especially during a time of remote learning and lockdowns.<\/p>\n The family\u2019s Christmas tree sports a plush doll: Ryan\u2019s World Red Titan.<\/p><\/div>\n \u201cI felt the teachers were trying their best to do what they could do but it was very hard,\u201d notes Loann, a former high school chemistry teacher. \u201cAnd because I had the privilege to stay home, I thought it was better for my kids if I just homeschooled. So, during that full year, I homeschooled Ryan and part of the curriculum was that I wanted him to have PE.<\/p>\n \u201cIt was hard to do that in Houston. We wanted an environment where we could have easy access to outside, where we\u2019re not, hey, can we go outside today? Is it too hot? Is it too cold? Is it rainy? We have a pool at home (in Houston) and we use it for only several months a year versus here. We\u2019ve been here a year and a half, and they\u2019ve been using it all year-round. It\u2019s just been really nice to be able to do that.\u201d<\/p>\n Ryan Kaji and his twin sisters, Emma and Kate, have outside interests beyond their involvement in the family production company, Sunlight Entertainment.<\/p><\/div>\n \u201cAlso, Ryan easily gets recognized when he\u2019s in public and before he gets too old, I wanted to find a safe community where everybody could watch over him, essentially,\u201d adds Shion. \u201cWhen we first came to Hawai\u2018i, we felt like it\u2019s got a very welcoming community, everybody helping to raise kids together and supporting the senior citizens, too.<\/p>\n \u201cIt\u2019s been great. The kids have been able to find new friends. They hang out all the time and their parents are really nice, too. They\u2019re always like, \u2018Oh, Ryan, you can call me Auntie and Uncle.\u2019<\/p>\n \u201cWe feel everybody is so much nicer here. I mean everybody in Houston is very nice, but Hawai\u2018i is on a whole different level.\u201d<\/p>\n Shion, who is Japanese, and Loann, who is Vietnamese, say Houston is still home base for them. It\u2019s where their families live and their company is headquartered. But they\u2019re also enjoying life in paradise, creating new memories on and off the camera.<\/p>\n \u201cWhen we decided maybe we should go to Hawai\u2018i, we actually took Ryan with us here to check out the place and see if he likes it,\u201d says Loann. \u201cHe ended up loving it. He loved hanging out at the beach. He was trying to surf, and I was like, \u2018What do you think about moving here?\u2019 He was like, \u2018Oh, that means I can go to the beach all the time,\u2019 so it just worked out.\u201d<\/p>\n Currently, Ryan, Emma and Kate attend the same school. In his free time, Ryan swims, plays tennis, enjoys rollerblading and started going to the gym with his friends (yes, he\u2019s growing up). He also has been taking \u201ccircus class\u201d for the past couple of years, learning juggling, card tricks and magic tricks.<\/p>\n Emma has jumped into karate, and together with Kate, they do swimming, gymnastics and piano lessons.<\/p>\n They also all serve as creative directors for the family\u2019s production company, Sunlight Entertainment.<\/p>\n \u201cWe always get the question of how Ryan balances his time,\u201d notes Loann. \u201cSince we moved to Hawai\u2018i, we only film 1-2 hours a week, and mainly on the weekends so he\u2019s able to have a lot of time doing extracurricular activities that he enjoys and hanging out with friends. That\u2019s our No. 1 priority: education and making sure that he still has a childhood.<\/p>\n \u201cA lot of our videos, he\u2019s in the beginning part or it\u2019s an animation or a compilation of his previous videos, so the cadence of us actually producing new content really is once a week, and because our videos aren\u2019t scripted it doesn\u2019t take too long to make.\u201d<\/p>\n Recently, Forbes <\/em>listed Ryan in its 2022 Top Creators Earnings at $27 million. In 2017, he became the youngest person to ever make a Forbes<\/em> top earners list with $11 million. And just two years before that was when Loann posted that very first video on YouTube of an adorable 3-year-old Ryan picking out a toy at Target. Initially called Ryan Toys-Review, the channel was renamed to Ryan\u2019s World and evolved from videos of Ryan opening toys to a mix of fun things like pretend play, science experiments, music videos, skits, challenges, DIY arts and crafts, and more.<\/p>\n \u201cIt was about four months after that (first video) we felt, OK, this is really big, we have to get support,\u201d recalls Shion, who worked as a structural engineer. \u201cWe were getting a lot of exposure around the world and a lot of kids just waiting for new videos \u2026<\/p>\n \u201cWe found it fascinating because we didn\u2019t have any equipment or any editing skills \u2026 but somehow it captured their minds.\u201d<\/p>\n Shion and Loann started researching ways to improve video quality and considered investing in equipment, but they didn\u2019t have a budget back then. They used a green tablecloth against a wall for a green screen, and put a shower curtain over the table to make it white.<\/p>\n \u201cThere\u2019s one video where we tried flashlights as studio lights,\u201d remembers Shion. \u201cWe\u2019re flashing the flashlights on Ryan\u2019s face and only his face is lighting up.\u201d<\/p>\n Now, the Kajis have a team of over 35 employees (including video editors, animators and videographers) working at Sunlight Entertainment, which they formed a year after launching their YouTube channel.<\/p>\n \u201cWe film (on our iPhones) in Hawai\u2018i and send it to them and they edit,\u201d reveals Shion. \u201cThat\u2019s why we\u2019re able to move here. We realized a lot of editors can just do it remote. There are a lot of new staff members we hired outside of Houston, some of them live in New York, California, Colorado \u2026 we were able to recruit a lot of good talent from all over the place.\u201d<\/p>\n There also is the Ryan\u2019s World brand side of the business, producing toys, video games, clothing and more, as well as collaborations, such as a toothpaste and toothbrush with Col-gate, cereal with Kellogg\u2019s and sneakers with Skechers.<\/p>\n \u201cWe have a lot of new exciting projects for next year that we cannot say in detail just yet but there are a lot of projects in connection with Hawai\u2018i,\u201d shares Shion. \u201cNow that we moved to Hawai\u2018i, we\u2019d like to contribute to the community here, and there are many projects that we\u2019re right now working on that has to do with Hawai\u2018i.<\/p>\n \u201cWe are working together with a company based in Hawai\u2018i,\u201d he adds. \u201cWe\u2019d love to help promote the culture and community and bring more awareness of how great Hawai\u2018i is.\u201d<\/p>\n WHAT IS YOUR FAVORITE TOY?<\/strong> \u201cExcept for my (Ryan\u2019s World) toys, probably Rubik\u2019s Cube. My record is not that fast, like 40-something seconds, but other people at my school can solve it in 30 or 20 seconds.\u201d<\/p>\n FAVORITE FOOD? <\/strong> \u201cSushi or Vietnamese banh cuon.\u201d<\/p>\n FAVORITE BOOK?<\/strong> \u201cHoles<\/em>.\u201d<\/p>\n FAVORITE MOVIE?<\/strong> \u201cThere\u2019s also a movie for Holes<\/em>. I really like it.\u201d<\/p>\n FAVORITE TV SHOW?<\/strong> \u201cI used to watch Kid Danger<\/em> a lot.\u201d<\/p>\n FAVORITE SUPERHERO?<\/strong> \u201cI guess Red Titan because that\u2019s like me. (Red Titan is a character in the Ryan\u2019s World Universe.)\u201d<\/p>\n FAVORITE VIDEO GAME?<\/strong> \u201cMinecraft<\/em>. It\u2019s really fun.\u201d<\/p>\n FAVORITE SUBJECT?<\/strong> \u201cMath. I really like adding numbers and multiplying.\u201d<\/p>\n FAVORITE YOUTUBER?<\/strong> \u201cI don\u2019t really have a favorite because I watch hundreds of different ones, but my favorite topics are gaming videos, mostly about Roblox<\/em> and Minecraft<\/em>.\u201d<\/p>\n WHAT DO YOU WANT TO BE WHEN YOU GROW UP?<\/strong> \u201cEither a gaming developer or a 3D artist or animator.\u201d<\/p>\n HOW DO YOU LIKE LIVING IN HAWAI\u2018I?<\/strong> \u201cIt\u2019s really nice. We can go outside because Hawai\u2018i has one of the lowest COVID rates. I used to hike Diamond Head a lot. It\u2019s really fun with my family.\u201d<\/p>\n WHAT MESSAGE DO YOU HAVE FOR YOUR FANS?<\/strong> \u201cIf they want to do YouTube, you should always do the topic of the video of what you want to do. It makes the video more fun and entertaining when you are very happy about it.\u201d<\/p>\n WHAT IS SOMETHING PEOPLE WOULD BE SURPRISED TO KNOW?<\/strong> \u201cI really like roller coasters and anime.\u201d<\/p>\n WHAT IS AT THE TOP OF YOUR WISH LIST?<\/strong> \u201cWhat I would want the most is a new graphics card (for computers).\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Making fun YouTube videos is the family business for Ryan Kaji, star of Ryan\u2019s World, and his \u2018ohana, who have..<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":1837,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1836","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-cover-story"],"yoast_head":"\n![\"\"](\"https:\/\/hawaii.carpentermediagroup.com\/midweekhawaii\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/12\/mw-122122-cover-ryan-kaji-ac-10.jpg\")
![\"\"](\"https:\/\/hawaii.carpentermediagroup.com\/midweekhawaii\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/12\/mw-122122-cover-ryan-kaji-ac-13.jpg\")
![\"\"](\"https:\/\/hawaii.carpentermediagroup.com\/midweekhawaii\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/12\/mw-122122-cover-ryan-kaji-ac-1.jpg\")
Inside Ryan’s World with its star Ryan Kaji<\/h3>\n