【Japanese Culture】 Expanding sales through New Year's sales and Fukubukuro
January 6, 2023 at 5:02 PM
Happy New Year!
New Year's holidays vary from country to country, but in Japan, it is a long holiday for about a week during the year-end and New Year holidays.
As Corona is coming to an end this year, many people in Japan seem to have returned home.
Oita and Fukuoka prefectures, where our offices are located, were very crowded, with many coming home.
The economy seems to recover little by little.
Corona is popular in China, and many of our clients in China have been infected with it. Please take good care of yourself.
That's enough for the New Year's greetings, and I'd like to write the first article in 2023 about the Japanese culture of "First sale" and "Fukubukuro."Among them, we will show you how foreign companies can use this culture to increase sales well.
First of all, "First sale."
The first sale is the first sale of the new year, as you can read.
Until a decade ago, all retailers were closed until the third day of the New Year, so January 4th was the first sale.
Due to lifestyle changes, the number of stores open 24 hours a day has increased, and many retailers are starting to sell for the first time on January 1st. The first sale will be held on January 2nd at the latest.
It is not uncommon for this first sale to have a discount rate of 50% to 70%.
Apparel is the main product that can be discounted so far, but high-priced products will be on sale at a discount rate of 10% to 30% at electronics retail stores.
And even if you cut it off from this first sale, you can't separate the lucky bag.
Fukubukuro dates back to the Edo period. At that time, kimono shops put pieces of cloth together in bags and sold them under the name of Ebisu-Ikebukuro. It also included expensive cloth with gold thread, so customers gathered for it. Since then, it has been renamed Fukubukuro and is sold as a lucky charm in various industries.
The Japanese love lucky charms. I also enjoy lucky bags to try my luck during the New Year. This year, lucky bags worth 700 million yen were also sold at department stores. Did it sell well?
Until a few years ago, the contents of the lucky bag were hidden. It was something that I enjoyed when I opened it, but the apparel industry often mixed and sold unsold products, so recently most of them have been sold by disclosing the contents of the bag.
Fukubukuro is also being sold in Japan's giant EC malls, AMAZON and Rakuten Market, but Anker was the only one selling Fukubukuro from overseas companies in EC.
It's a big opportunity because it seems that there are still few lucky bags sold by foreign companies.
It is basic to set the price 20 to 30 percent cheaper than buying at a fixed price.
For example, for Anker, the total amount of the lucky bag of 15,000 yen will be around 20,000 yen.
If it is difficult to make lucky bags with our products alone, it is also effective to make lucky bags in collaboration with other companies.
For example, if your brand is still not well-known in Japan, there are many ways to make lucky bags with companies that are not competitive but related products, or combine them with Japanese snacks that anyone can enjoy.
Some products are not suitable for this area, so if you want to try the lucky bag next year, you can help us if you consult with us.
Next year, it will be a long way off, so I will omit the details, but why don't you try the 2024 lucky bag?