Not an expert, but from what I saw: fancy peaches sold individually and melons. These are supposed to be good gifts to bring as a guest.
They're definitely exceptional cases, but in general tropical fruit (mangos, pineapples, even bananas) can be up to two or three times the price you might be used to paying in the US (or even Australia - not sure what it's like now but when I was in the US 15 years ago I remember bananas being especially cheap even in supermarkets - here you generally have to go to dedicated fruit/veg markets to get fresh produce che…
Bananas are cheap in part because they are clones and incredibly predictable in terms of when they will ripen (therefore when to pick them, when to ship them, etc).
I went to Japan with some friends for 3 weeks, and we just couldn't figure out how these stores are stocked, we didn't see any familymart, 7 eleven or lawson trucks. At some point we just kinda assumed everything was stored frozen in the back, but the article's line: "Lunch is a busy time at the konbini. Konbinis have large scale operations that deliver fresh bentos (lunch boxes) to stores" refutes that assumption.
I guess maybe the trucks they use just aren't branded? Maybe we just were never in the right place at the right time?
I wish here in the USA we could get convenience stores even close to how good they are in places like Japan and Thailand. Why do they get 7-11: The Good Version?
Not sure especially since the Japanese company 7 and i holdings now owns even the American 7-11 brand.
But having lived in Japan, I also missed some of the North American 7-11 food: pizza[1], hot dogs[2], and slurpees are not available at 7-11 in Japan.
[1] They have pizza bread which is fluffy bread with a sprinkling of onions, corn, tomato sauce and mayo which is not great
[2] They have hot dogs but it's fluffy bread with a toothpick-diameter sausage inside. It's a shame because they also sell decent deep-fried on a stick but without the bun
I wish here in the USA we could get convenience stores even close to how good they are in places like Japan and Thailand. Why do they get 7-11: The Good Version?
I think it might just be related to city density, you need a lot of people in a small area to make conbinis work. (I know they are in rural areas in japan as well, but my guess is that they are either loss leaders, or are possible because of the amount of infrastructure that is already in place to make them work in the big cities.)
Also, conbinis go well with walking and public transport culture. The USA's car culture with their necessity for big parking lots and lack of walking culture, just don't sound like they'd be very compatible with conbinis, except maybe at gas stations. Though, it is not like Europe has them even though I wish we did (I am guessing this might be down to cost of real estate, workers, and again, city density, some of which also apply to the USA of course).
I went to Japan with some friends for 3 weeks, and we just couldn't figure out how these stores are stocked, we didn't see any familymart, 7 eleven or lawson trucks. At some point we just kinda assumed everything was stored frozen in the back, but the article's line: "Lunch is a busy time at the konbini. Konbinis have large scale operations that deliver fresh bentos (lunch boxes) to stores" refutes that assumption. I…
The majority of nonperishable items are restocked during the midnight shift. Fresh items do get delivered during the day.
Search for コンビニ配送トラック and you'll see branded trucks doing deliveries.
They're definitely exceptional cases, but in general tropical fruit (mangos, pineapples, even bananas) can be up to two or three times the price you might be used to paying in the US (or even Australia - not sure what it's like now but when I was in the US 15 years ago I remember bananas being especially cheap even in supermarkets - here you generally have to go to dedicated fruit/veg markets to get fresh produce che…
Bananas are cheap in part because they are clones and incredibly predictable in terms of when they will ripen (therefore when to pick them, when to ship them, etc).
Yes but that doesn't explain why they would be substantially cheaper in US supermarkets vs Australian ones (after all, they're all grown here!), or why they're so much cheaper at dedicated produce markets. Apparently you can buy 8 bananas for $1.50 at a US Costco - not sure what Costco prices here are like (I do happen to live near one of the few stores in the country but have never been), but it wouldn't be unusual to pay almost $4 for that many at most supermarkets here, or around $2-3 (sometimes less) at a market, assuming 8 bananas weigh roughly 1kg. I can't find a reliable source for Japanese supermarket prices but my memory was something close to 400¥/kg a few years back, where that translated to ~$5 AUD. Mangoes could be 800¥ each, easily double or even triple the price they are here, and yes, watermelons (even the regular kind) are especially expensive, 1000+¥ for a smallish (~1kg) melon would be considered a bargain. Interestingly they're often grown locally (the super expensive square ones exclusively so), from what I can read, though I gather most are imported.
Regular fruit at a regular cheap grocery store in Tokyo is still 2-3x as expensive as the USA, even in relatively expensive US cities You can get sushi that's actually good for 80% cheaper than the "California rolls with crap on them" you'll find in most of the USA, though, so it all evens out IMO
>Regular fruit at a regular cheap grocery store in Tokyo is still 2-3x as expensive as the USA, even in relatively expensive US cities It's also 2-3x the quality and taste. Strawberries in the US have no taste at all; in Japan, they're amazing.
Strawberries in California are fucking delicious, even the half-rotten ones they sell at Target
Bananas are cheap in part because they are clones and incredibly predictable in terms of when they will ripen (therefore when to pick them, when to ship them, etc).
Yes but that doesn't explain why they would be substantially cheaper in US supermarkets vs Australian ones (after all, they're all grown here!), or why they're so much cheaper at dedicated produce markets. Apparently you can buy 8 bananas for $1.50 at a US Costco - not sure what Costco prices here are like (I do happen to live near one of the few stores in the country but have never been), but it wouldn't be unusual…
Bananas shouldn't be used as a baseline. USA supermarkets explicitly use them as a loss leader because they've discovered that nobody comes in to buy just bananas when they want bananas.