Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

The realities of 'owning' a Japanese convenience store

japantimes.co.jp

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

191–200 of 233 posts

Re: The realities of 'owning' a Japanese convenience store

#191

Post by euler_angles »

TulliusCicero wrote: post #168
dang wrote: post #79

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Even for HN, these are some of the most empathy-deficient comments that I've ever read. That seems badly exaggerated, unless I'm missing some horrible comments. As for "Even for HN": this is the kind of putdown of the community that I feel compelled to respond to, since no one else will. Yes, people post unpleasant things to Hacker News, often without realizing it. But the overwhelming majority of users here are fa…

Thank you for articulating this. I've noticed these kinds of comments are common on reddit, and since becoming a mod of a reasonably popular subreddit they've irked me, but I allowed them in the interest of free-ish speech/not wanting to be authoritarian, and also because I couldn't articulate exactly what the problem was. After all, I didn't think criticism of a given subreddit was categorically bad. This: > It's al…

So I've been lurking on HN for over a decade...the moderators here are very very good at fostering good discussion while eliminating toxicity.

If you want to be a better moderator of any internet community you'd do well to study how it's done here.

Re: The realities of 'owning' a Japanese convenience store

#192

Post by seanmcdirmid »

baby wrote: post #189
CydeWeys wrote: post #176

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You have to go pretty far down the development scale of nations before you get to undrinkable tap water. I didn't have any problems drinking the tap water in Bangkok for a week, for example.

that's not true. There are only a few countries in south-east asia with drinkable tap water: brunei, hong kong, japan, singapore, and south korea. You should probably not have drunk that water in Bangkok.

Even within a country, whether a specific city has potable water or not can vary. Bangkok technically has potable water from its source, but the pipes it might travel through can be broken and dirty (the same is true in Beijing, actually). In this case, you can get lucky...but it is better not to chance it.

Re: The realities of 'owning' a Japanese convenience store

#193

Post by pyrale »

TulliusCicero wrote: post #166
pyrale wrote: post #78

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I guess smaller opening times would also solve the issue. I have yet to understand why societies tolerate such things as stores open at 3am, given the productivity it has, and the implications for workers.

There's nothing inherently wrong with stores open odd hours. Some people like to keep odd hours, some have to because of the nature of their job (a lot of maintenance/repair/cleaning stuff is done at night), so some stores being open works with that. And of course there are places like clubs where night hours make more sense. This situation in Japan seems unusual, usually a business would only stay open late if there…

The "Some people like to work odd hours" is pretty tired in my opinion. Most people who work these hours are doing it out of necessity.

If execs were forced to work whenever some of their employees work, their imagination about who likes what would change dramatically.

Re: The realities of 'owning' a Japanese convenience store

#194

Post by magduf »

Retric wrote: post #172
protonfish wrote: post #157

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Profit = income - expense. The other way to maximize profit is reduce wasteful operating expenses.

As long as your chasing profit not revenue expenses are already part of the equation. If being open at 2am provides 1$ an hour of profit, that’s still profit.

It's questionable if you're going to get any profit at all when you have to pay someone to man the store at odd hours when there's almost no customers. A few people coming in during the late-night shift and buying $3 worth of stuff each is not going to pay that employee's salary.

Re: The realities of 'owning' a Japanese convenience store

#195

Post by ako »

icebraining wrote: post #85
ako wrote: post #41

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Are you really sure that capitalism will reduce global poverty? The core of capitalism is competition. This may result in higher quality and larger choice, but if these are sufficient enough it will in the end result in lower prices. This has to be done through efficiency but will also result in lower wages. I think unconstrained, uncontrolled capitalism will result in 90% of the global population working very low in…

> I think unconstrained, uncontrolled capitalism will result in 90% of the global population working very low income, replaceable jobs, or being completely replaced by automation. I think that's likely; after all, capitalism already replaced the jobs of 90% of the developed world population with automation and other efficiencies: that's why most of us no longer work in agriculture. Now, was that a net negative develo…

Capitalism (free markets) is just a tool, not a silver bullet. Depending on the situation it might be the correct tool, or if may be the wrong tool. It is also fine to combine different tools. Some markets are best served by capitalism, others are better served by a monopoly, or a state organized market. Most of the world already concluded that healthcare (insurance) and a free market are not the best fit.

Re: The realities of 'owning' a Japanese convenience store

#196

Post by magduf »

hulahoof wrote: post #93
rangibaby wrote: post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The effects of the Lehman shock and 3/11 disaster hit the middle class hard, the blame is pointed at millennials for being thrifty (Why aren't young people buying luxury cars? Why do young people buy everything second hand?), but the reality is that middle class Japanese have less disposable income than 10,20, and especially 30 years ago

Seems to be the recurring theme to blame millennials for the hardships of the middle class globally. I wonder if any developed countries middle class is faring well currently?

Like a bunch of other people in this thread, apparently, I was also in Japan about a month ago.

From what I saw, the whole place looked middle-class, and like everyone was doing fine. I think I might have seen one homeless person the whole time I was there (and I'm not sure about that; they were just begging, and didn't have a bunch of stuff with them); I saw more poverty in Germany, and I see far more in the US.

Japan's middle class might not have as much disposable income as it did in the 1980s, but from what I saw, it wasn't doing badly at all. It certainly looks a lot healthier than the US's middle class.

Re: The realities of 'owning' a Japanese convenience store

#197

Post by magduf »

ken wrote: post #68
bane wrote: post #3

Just came back from Japan and man are there too many convenience stores. Within any given area there is probably 6 to 7 stores within eyeshot and an easy walk. It's weird thinking that they are too convenient, but honestly they start to become pointless. More than once we simply walked by a few knowing that there would be another one just a minute or two more down the street. It's great that we could find something t…

Compared to what? Here in the USA there are several places within walking distance from my home that have a Starbucks across the street from another Starbucks. One of them is an intersection where 3 of the 4 corners have a Starbucks. There's at least one building here with 2 Starbucks in it, in case taking the elevator is too much hassle. Japan doesn't sound all that much different in this respect.

To be fair, a Japanese convenience store is far more useful than a Starbucks. You can buy all kinds of things there, including healthy foods. Starbucks mostly just has overpriced coffee drinks and confections. At a conbini, you can get a healthy meal, and you can even microwave it there, you can get cash from the ATM, you can get a SIM card for your phone, etc. The two just aren't comparable.

Re: The realities of 'owning' a Japanese convenience store

#198

Post by magduf »

RyJones wrote: post #24

I also just came back from Tokyo and Osaka; I was blown away by how many 7/11s there were and how close they were. The vending machines are amazing. One other thing I would like to import: the widely available, clean bathrooms all over the place. That was super nice.

>One other thing I would like to import: the widely available, clean bathrooms all over the place. That was super nice.

Don't forget how almost every public restroom even has a washlet.

But we can't have these things in the US. Americans can't even be bothered to flush the toilet, and like to scrawl graffiti on bathroom walls. The only way we'd have the super-clean public bathrooms of Japan is to keep them locked, or have a pay-per-use scheme with cameras monitoring them to see who pees on the toilet seat without cleaning it.

Re: The realities of 'owning' a Japanese convenience store

#199

Post by magduf »

Kurtz79 wrote: post #121
masklinn wrote: post #101

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Once you know those nothing beats pulling a warm can of black coffee from the machine. I'd say pulling a bottle of warm lemon / lime tea was even better, especially with travel-sore-throat. > low prices Aside from providing warm drinks, that's the big ticket right there: IME, european vending machines are basically predatory, they're way overpriced for what they provide and rely on necessity or impulse rather than…

"Aside from providing warm drinks, that's the big ticket right there: IME, european vending machines are basically predatory, they're way overpriced for what they provide and rely on necessity or impulse rather than just doing good business." Absolutely agree: I don't remember the last time I bought something from a public vending machine (or even seeing someone else doing so) here in Spain. Prices are anywhere betwe…

Same here. I never buy from vending machines in the US or Europe. In Japan, the prices are low and the quality good, so I bought several things, including ice cream. There's no way I'd buy the garbage ice cream we make in America from a vending machine, but the stuff in Japan is pretty good and a nice treat on a hot day, and was only Y140.

Re: The realities of 'owning' a Japanese convenience store

#200

Post by la_barba »

CydeWeys wrote: post #16

I was just in Japan two weeks ago, and convenience stores were omnipresent. I'll admit, it was incredibly convenient, as I never went for lack of food or water, and I got into habit of grabbing a beer and a snack every night to take back to my hotel room before bed. I was relying on them (and vending machines) pretty heavily for coffee and green tea throughout the day as well. There were way too many convenience stor…

I was there about a year back and I too remember thinking why they had so mayn vending machines, and also at seemingly odd/random spots. It felt a bit shady buying alcohol from a vending machine without showing ID, but maybe thats just cultural conditioning..
Post reply on HN