“Fukubukuro” or the lucky-dip bag has been an annual event
staged by retailers in Japan to welcome in the new year
since the Edo period (1608 – 1868). As its name suggests,
fukubukuro is normally a large paper shopping bag containing a variety of
goods. Today many department stores and large-scale retail shops will put
fukubukuro on sale when they open at the beginning of the new year. There
are exceptions where the contents of the bag are actually made public, but traditionally the bag is sealed so that the
customers do not know what it contains until
they open it. With the value of the goods inside usually far exceeding the price, so that
a bag sold at ¥10,000 may actually contain merchandise worth ¥30,000, it is usually
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considered a real bargain buy. Some may
consider not knowing what you are spending
your money on to be silly, but for many
fukubukuro is not just an exercise in bargain
shopping but also a fun way to test one’s luck! |
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| Fukubukuro priced at between ¥5,000 and ¥20,000, and containing a
variety of trendy fashion items, are very popular. |
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