I am running late for my dinner and just made it to the supermarket before they shut. If you get here at this time there is not much selection, but what is still left on the shelves is being discounted. The discount stickers change as the clock approaches closing time, and the discounts get better and better.
Here is a selection of some discounted food tonight.
Do you get special discounts at your supermarket as they approach closing time?
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No special discounts :S It sucks …
Sushi for 1080 yen is nice … to eat packet sushi in the place I live you have to spend like 3000 yen – Poland 😉
thats 40% of from 1,080, so we are talking around 650 Yen !! 🙂
40% off over here too!
okazu beans
A big 50% off here.
Dirty cheap! 🙂
I knew about this, was on a previous article I believe. Lol
caught in the supermarket discount basement again 😉
That’s one of my favorite pass times haha, stalking the super market at night and eating the delicious prepared food on discount! ^^ Of course I can only do this in Japan since the super markets here are open 24 hours, and the prepared food is dished up to order.
hahaha ! I always buy discount sushi near the end of a day at 4-5 or so. Always at the same nice place, that’s on Asakusa dori in Ueno not far from the 7/11 there (across a K-books) it’s a sort of family sushi place, not a chain I think.
Usually I eat later in the evening than back at home . So grabbing a box of discounted sushi for 500-600 yen is a great way to slightly fill up for the rest of the evening to come. Sure as hell beats Mcdonalds !
Is it even worth to compare with McD’s? 🙂
When I’ll be in Jp I guess I won’t need to worry over food price.
The thing with McD’s in Japan is that it has the uncanny ability to *always* be there, whenever everything else around you is closed and your hungry 🙂 So even tough when i’m in Japan, and I don’t want to eat McD’s (if I want a burger it’s either Freshness or MOS burger. Aptly nicknamed Mos def burger -anyway) i always end up doing it against my will. Just got out of clubbing, or moments before clubbing ? Shit. McD’s. Stuck late in an Izakaya, travelled back home somehow, and want something to fill the stomache before hitting the sack ? McD -_- . Or I was cought in the rain without an umbrella on two oceasions and needed shelter .. damn McD again ! ARGH ! LEAVE ME ALONE *_* lol . Having said that. It IS interesting for a Western guy temporarily in Japan to check out McD’s for their odd-ball Japan only stuff. Ebi burger for example. Or to observe how people can spend *HOURS* doing random things inside Mcdonalds on a single cup a joe ? (Western) Fast food in Japan,is EVERYTHING BUT fast.
Oddly enough the “Japanese” fastfood (a.k.a curry/ramen) is eat & go in 5 minutes flat.
But McD’s and KFC and such ? oh hell people will shop on Ebay on their laptops, do homework, play PSP networked games like Senjou no Kizuna; hell even sleep.Of interesting note, you do pay more for Western style junk/fast food in comparison to the (healthier,heartier) Japanese fastfood stuff. McD’s menu `n drinks can easily rake you 900 Yen whilst a nice big curry bowl can go for 550 Yen provided you don’t step into a “name is everything” chain like GO! GO! Gorilla (Tough they do have ridiculously American sized plates there)
Eh ! 😀 I guess i talked too much again 🙂
Sure, McD and KFC is more like a club for those who want to hang out 🙂
SUSHI!!!
The last time I was in the US, the supermarkets would generally rather throw things out than offer a discounted price. Kinda greedy, but maybe they worry that if they started discounting the price people would just come at the last minute and buy it cheap and never buy at full price. The way costs are rising in the US it wouldn’t surprise me.
I also don’t recall ever seeing discounts on items like this in Singapore. The closest grocery store often runs out of these fresh items long before closing, so I think they only make a small amount to avoid having to do discounts or possibly throw away food.
RT @tweetmeme Japan Supermarket Dinner, Japan shopping | Shibuya246 http://bit.ly/4B52jr No such luck in my neck of the woods. the stores around here don’t wait untill they close to mark down foods. the only things reduced or the bread and desset items. Which is usually like day old or very close to experiation date. they figure they all offer the lowest prices on food to not worry about what is left in those food cases.
I’m always stunned when I see people buying these sorts of expensive deli foods. Considering the low quality of the food (it’s really not healthy) and the fact that you could buy and easily make an easy meal for about 1/4 to 1/3 of the price, I can’t imagine people paying for pre-made bentos. I’m particularly surprised when I see people (especially housewives) buy them at around 3:00-5:00 pm when they aren’t getting off of work.
I think I need some cooking lessons ;(
The best and easiest awnser as to “why” is quite simply time restrictions. I can cook pretty good myself. But i don’t have the time for that everyday of the week and i’d resort to buying pre-made stuff on the way home from after a long day on those days. It’s cheaper than ordering take out in case you go the non-cook-it-yourself-way.
Here on the west coast USA, the large corporate type supermarkets or warehouse club stores statistically keep track of the number of customers on a per day per time of day basis. The more expensive items sometimes get made on a per time of day basis while mass market items like prepackaged sushi and sushi rolls are on a per day basis. Per day means if monday has 520, tuesday has 450, friday has 750, then they will make like 5 to 10 more. Depending on the pride of being in stock, places like my local Sam’s (warehouse club) tweaks the number so that they are almost always in stock by closing time. The goal is to have as few “out of stock” days in the year as possible while being overstocked as few as possible. Such a gaming decision is easily obtained from the relational database formulas.
I have seen no store discount food other than if the food has not sold and it is the next day. The stores do not want customers stalking the store at closing time to get the lowest price as they already spend advertising money to get customers to come and buy on wants and needs while they are immediately in the store. Leftover food that cannot go to the next day such as bakery goods, roast chickens, etc, get to be taken home by the store staff in some stores. Some give it to charity, but most just throw it away. Giving it to employees at closing time is not done by many due to lawsuits of discrimination by employees who want to modify their work schedules to end up at the closing time for food “benefits”. Giving food away is also risky due to lawsuits of food spoilage as I was told by one supermarket manager when I asked about all the unsold food they had.
Basically, the USA is a land of great food waste. There is little respect for homeless and poor, so the vast majority of unsold food never gets to them either due to disdain or because the store employees want to keep the food for themselves to take home.