SpongeBob SquarePants is hugely popular in the United States with little children and immature adults like myself, but nobody thought he would make much of a splash in Japan.

It turns out those people were wrong, because SpongeBob is watched by 1.9 million households every day in Japan, which is even more impressive when you take into consideration that the series is only shown occasionally on network TV and that many households don't have cable or satellite, where SpongeBob SquarePants is shown on a more regular basis.

Also, it's not little kids who love SpongeBob the most, it's young women. This wasn't an accident, though: SpongeBob was introduced to Japan as a trendy, hip, underground kinda thing, something to be found on clothes and handbags and spread around by word of mouth. Apparently, it's been working.

[via The Beat]