So this is another long overdue blog post... (〃艸〃)
So in Japan after New Year’s Day, a massive sale breaks out nationwide, it’s called 初売り or hatsuuri which roughly means “the first sale of the year”.
Sale items on a table at Loft. Look at all the people!
I would say that it’s a bigger more extravagant event than Black Friday here in the U.S. and will go on for several days to several weeks. And unlike in the U.S. where it’s an all out brawl to get that plasma TV at a 50% discount, really hot items in Japan will usually have a really long line facilitated by store employees hold signs telling you where the end of the line is.
Employees handing out free Loft sample bags to the people waiting in lines.
Many of these hot ticket items are 福袋 (fukubukuro) or lucky bags which are mystery bags with an assortment of heavily discounted items that stores sell. Most department store brands have their own lucky bags and loyal customers will line up early in the morning outside the store in hopes of snagging one of those limited edition bags.
I spent winter vacation up until New Year’s Day in Tokyo. To get from Tokyo back to Sendai, we took a night bus which arrived at Sendai station at ~5am January 2nd. This positioned us in downtown Sendai at a perfect time to start queuing up for those lucky bags. The initial plan was to go to Uniqlo and get their lucky bag, so we lined up outside the department store.
It was pretty dark and kinda cold, but at least it wasn’t raining right? At 7am the department store opened its main entrance so we could line up inside the building instead of outside in the cold. We didn’t know at the time that that line was actually the line for Starbucks lucky bags, and by the time we found out it was like “hey, why not.” Apparently they had only one hundred bags available so the store employees handed out redeemable lucky bag tickets to everyone waiting in line so the 101th customer could go line up for some other place.
Starbucks barista busily putting Starbucks lucky bags out.
My friend happily exchanged her ticket for a small lucky bag, I didn’t wind up getting one. I could have if I wanted to but I’m not a starbucks super fan or anything. Inside her bag (if I recall correctly) was a starbucks coffee tumbler, various starbucks coffee beans, a starbucks gift card, and some other stuff I can’t remember.
After that we ran all the way upstairs to the Uniqlo only to find out that they didn’t actually have a lucky bag that year. But it was only ~8am which was still plenty of time to go get lucky bags in other places, so we went to Loft which I blogged about here. Our target wasn’t actually the Loft lucky bag but the Lush lucky bag which was in the Loft store. I’ve never bought any Lush products before but I figured if all the beauty youtubers only ever rave about their stuff, I can’t go wrong.
Lush employees enticing young women to buy 5000 yen and 2500 yen Lush lucky bags.
I got my Lush lucky bag inside of a Lush bag. Bagception.
The beauty unfolded.
Inside the bag was:
The Comforter Shower Cream which is that pink bottle up there. I thought it smelled kinda like that pink soap you get in public restrooms that remind you of medicine, but it was alright. It was really sparkly though.
Little Dragon which is that red looking popsicle stick looking thing. I’m not too sure what it is and I still haven’t gotten the chance to use it.
Green Gold which is the green and gold (who would’ve guessed) soap bar. I currently use it as my hand soap, and I generally like it. It has a bunch of fibers in it which is pretty good for scrubbing. This one’s also sparkly.
Fun - Gold which is that gold candy looking thing. It’s some kind of multi purpose soap, it smells a lot like toffee and we all know that toffee is delicious.
Guardians of the Forest which is the green bathbomb. I actually got to use it because Japan’s big on the bathing culture and my tiny bathroom actually came with a bathtub. So I got to relax in my tiny bathtub in glittery green liquid while watching Kill la Kill (which is definitely a weirdo anime).
Hanimi Scrub was the final thing in there, the whiteish looking round thing. It was a salt scrub, for exfoliating and stuff. While I appreciate it’s dead skin cell scouring abilities it also tasted pretty cool, like salty flowers.
After grabbing the Lush lucky bag we went upstairs to the 5th floor to the MUJI store for their lucky can (which comes in a can instead of a bag). It cost 2016 yen since it was the year 2016 ;D. Apparently they also had lucky bags but those were only available at other MUJI locations.
The one. The only. The MUJI lucky can.
Luckily I didn’t need a can opener to open this one.
Dissected and laid out.
Inside was:
A handkerchief with a cat on it. They had different handkerchiefs in different cans, my friend got a red one with a daruma on it. I think that all the characters on the handkerchiefs had something to do with the New Year but don’t quote me on that one.
A monkey bobble head. It’s a monkey since it’s the year of the monkey, it’s made out of paper and hand painted. MUJIs in different cities had different ornaments in their cans. The monkey bobble head was specific to Sendai, and looking through the catalogue of what each city got I think ours was the prettiest.
Finally there was a gift card for MUJI for 2016 yen, so in the end I didn’t actually spend any money to get this lucky can. I went back the next week to buy a bunch of MUJI pens.
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