
Candy Japan 2017 Year in Review - hamstercat
https://www.candyjapan.com/behind-the-scenes/2017-year-in-review
======
SyneRyder
I'm glad to see this, as so often Year In Review posts are by companies
humblebragging about how well they're doing, and they stop posting Year In
Review when it's been a down year. It's refreshing to see a post that isn't
"we're Crushing It", but is honest and real. (Though I hope next year will be
more positive though!)

Also, I don't know if this has any SEO impact, but I thought the sitewide
"flags" link in the footer of Candy Japan looked suspicious. At first I
wondered if the site had been hacked or if you'd started selling backlinks,
before I realized it's a requirement of the Creative Commons Attribution
licence for the flag images. Maybe experiment with removing that from the
sitewide, and just putting that link on a Credits / About Us page?

I'd love to read more about hiring the photographer & your artist. The artwork
in the blog posts is amazing!

~~~
bemmu
It wasn't that difficult. I just posted both as jobs on UpWork, then spent an
hour looking through the portfolios of people who applied.

------
waytogo
I am following Candy Japan for years and I like the idea. In its early years
the landing page was super charming despite its bootstrapped style. Now in
2017, it just looks aged. I mean the entire presentation, the dull white
packaging without any branding and the still unexciting pictures feel like
somebody lost all motivation and ambition. No offense, just my perception.

I just googled competitors and all of them feel way more vibrant + being more
active on social media (I checked Instagram for the first two):

[https://www.japancrate.com/](https://www.japancrate.com/)

[https://tokyotreat.com/](https://tokyotreat.com/)

[https://wowbox.jp/](https://wowbox.jp/)

[http://www.kawaiibox.com/](http://www.kawaiibox.com/)

[https://www.sushicandy.net/](https://www.sushicandy.net/)

Building a slick landing page which is also responsive can be quite some work
but looking at that competition it's a must, sorry. Look, it's not that people
really need a monthly candy box, it's not a rational decision, it's something
emotional—an impulse buy. So, if the landing page isn't even thrilling what
should then trigger the buy?

Social media in particular Instagram might be a significant marketing channel
because Japanese candy and its colourfulness is tailor-made for Instagram.

Maybe the business model is also the problem. There are little lock-
ins/network effects and a low-barrier market entry for Japanese entities, thus
all these competitors. There might be opportunities to pivot the business or
extend into new fields/models. The first thing which comes to mind is
licensing successful products for exclusive import/distribution to key western
markets. Different game but highly scalable. Maybe there more unseen
opportunities. If not then selling the business could be an option (after a
final revamp re presentation and SEO).

However, Candy Japan has still one major strength: Frequently placing stories
on social news sites like HN and Reddit which always hit top 10 positions and
generate tons of free traffic (should be 20-30k visits per placement which
would translate in 200 to 300 subs at 1% conversion).

~~~
discreditable
I'm a current Candy Japan subscriber and have been for a long time. Looking
over some of those they simply seem like a better deal. An average Candy Japan
box has 4-5 items in it and you get two per month. That comes to $29/mo for
8-10 items. JapanCrate advertises 15 items at $30/mo. Tokyotreat is 17 items
at $31.50/mo. Wowbox is 10-14 for $25/mo or 12-16 for $34.99/mo. Kawaii Box is
8-10 for $20/mo. SushiCandy is 20 items @ $15.99/mo.

To my eyes at least, CandyJapan seems to be the worst option of all of them.
I'm afraid that they're simply being out-competed and without some rethinking
of their model they will continue to lose subscribers over time. After looking
at those competitors just now I will certainly be rethinking my subscription.

~~~
Fnoord
> Tokyotreat is 17 items at $31.50/mo.

No it isn't. It is 17 items for 35 USD/month if you pay per month. It is 31.50
USD/month if you follow their 12 month prepay plan (aka sub for a year and pay
in advance).

We also shouldn't put too much stress on the amount of items. It isn't
descriptive of what's in the box. Tokyotreat is specific with what's in the
box.

These services also seem to have more lightweight, cheaper deals:

* Japancrate's Mini is 5 items for 12 USD/month, original is 25 USD/month with 10 items (1 DIY kit), and the Premium is 30 USD/month with 15 items (1 DIY kit, 1 drink, and 1 bonus item so its 16).

* Sushicandy has a set of 20 for 16 USD, a set of 30 for 20 USD, and a set of 40 for 27 USD. With also, like Japancrate, the option to sub for 3 or 6 months.

* Wowbox has a 15% coupon right now, and has a "try it out" button on the landing page. That invites me to give it a whirl. They also have different themes, and allow me to select different size of packages.

* Kawaiibox specialises in the kawaii candy theme (I suppose? I'm very newbie to this whole theme stuff or Japanese candy but I am curious). Its 19.90 USD for 8-10 items with discount options available if you subscribe for longer. The discounts are modest: 18.90 USD for 18.20 USD for 6 or 12 months respectively.

* Tokyotreat I discussed above as it all started my post, but since GP mentioned 5 companies I want 5 bullets in list. Its more expensive than Candy Japan, but you also get more items.

Even though you had that detail wrong you are right that all of these are
indeed cheaper than Candy Japan. I feel like Candy Japan is a very small
business compared to these (which isn't going to volume, but then again the
question is, is it going for quality then?) and no offence, but a 10% coupon
on Candy Japan isn't going to cut it compared to the competition.

All seem to provide free shipping world-wide. Payment options vary. The ones I
checked accepted credit card, some accepted PayPal as well but not all.

As a final note, again no offence but you're basically exporting some stuff
you buy in bulk from some local stores. In my language we call companies that
sell technology equipment with low margin "dozenschuiver" (box mover, aka
Sokoban). 50 USD/hour isn't a bad wage at all in that field. Larger Asian
stores (called toko here) might even sell Japanese candy. You can't compete
with that, so you want it to remain a special niche.

~~~
discreditable
I agree that items/box is a bad metric. A regular-size butterfinger amounts to
4 kid-size. I'm not sure what a better metric might be.

> the question is, is it going for quality then?

I wouldn't say so. The candy in CandyJapan boxes seems about average. I've
actually seen some of their candy brands in local grociers' foreign food isles
quite cheaply. This leads me to believe the CandyJapan stuff is nothing
particularly special. Some of the DIY candy kits they include lately are gross
too—they're usually some variant of slime + sugar/flavor.

As a side note I actually ordered a Tokyotreat box. They have decent item
count and they include a drink as well. I've really enjoyed some of the random
Japanese drinks I've tried and I'm looking forward to receiving some!

------
Xixi
The box subscription business model is getting harder and harder as
competition increases. I can relate on two points with my own Japanese tea-of-
the-month subscription ([https://tomotcha.com](https://tomotcha.com)):

\- At one point customs were very slow to clear in Germany (one to two
months), though shipments never actually bounced back. Paying for tea and not
getting it is frustrating. Then eventually it arrives, two months late. We
lost customers because of it. Eventually that problem went away and now
shipments are going through as usual.

\- Competition: we used not to have too much competition when we launched 3
years ago, now similar services are aplenty. It hurts conversion rates, a
lot...

~~~
Toast_25
It sounds really worth it if I earned USD. Unfortunately I live in a place
with a weaker currency and a strong immigrant population. I'll definitely
subscribe once I try the teas they have around :)

~~~
Xixi
I'm actually thinking to add currencies besides only USD and EUR. At the end
of the day we don't have any particular love for either, since our costs are
all in JPY. The biggest issue is to not clutter up the interface...

~~~
Toast_25
The world wide shipping makes the prices worth what you're getting, but it
doesn't change the fact that my currency isn't that great.

What I've seen in some e-commerce shops is that they automatically change the
currency based on the customer's location and have a small option on the
bottom or top right of the site displaying available currencies. For your site
a dropdown menu/box for the currency to the right of the price might be best.

------
bold_panda
My thoughts:

Subscription boxes are hard. I sold mine.

It's hard to keep subscribers happy every month, especially with food.

Most profitable subscription boxes are profitable because they are run by
savvy internet marketers & capitalize on novelty, trends, & gifting, not
because the products deliver incredible value to the customer.

I think Proactiv is the only subscription box service that's stood the test of
time without having to drastically change their business model and they have
historically been extremely savvy with their marketing.

If you look at the landscape of subscription boxes, it suggests that for
longterm growth & profit:

1\. Curation doesn't work.

2\. You have to make / manufacture / private label your own stuff (Dollar
Shave Club & Proactiv)

3\. You should raise money, use that money to sell your first million boxes at
a loss, grow rapidly and try to race towards an exit.

4\. If your product doesn't solve a major problem (acne sucks, razors are too
expensive etc), you are probably doomed over long term (10-20 year horizon),
so it's best to sell in year 3-5.

------
stevekemp
I recently moved to Finland, and briefly considered setting up an online shop
to export Salmiakki to the UK, as lots of people there seem to love it and beg
me to bring it when I returned.

I'm amused you're from Finland, but instead are importing Japanese candy! (In
the end I decided I couldn't be bothered with the hassle. I just make sure
every time I do return to the UK I pack my suitcase with 10-40 boxes of
candy.)

~~~
pimeys
Please import me some proper rye bread, karjalanpiirakka and lakkahillo every
week. There are no such things here in Berlin.

~~~
bemmu
I think this store can send these things to you:
[https://www.suomikauppa.fi/index.php?language=en](https://www.suomikauppa.fi/index.php?language=en)

------
adventured
You mention the decline in search ranking and Google traffic.

I'd strongly suggest you set up on Pinterest, Instagram and YouTube.

I would do an occasional YouTube video, talking about and showing people the
various types of Japanese candy. Maybe do just one per week, focused on a
group of related candy. I read your post about YouTube traffic and correlation
to sales, I think the solution to that is what it tends to be with everything
marketing: consistently drive it over a long period of time (obviously along
with clickable links to your site, which the blogged-about video lacked).

I'd post nice, alluring photos to Pinterest and Instagram. Making sure to
update both accounts at least weekly. Every item from every box should
eventually get an Instagram post, with a description. Japanese candy packaging
always seems to my US eyes to be very colorful, energetic, with fun designs -
which I think lends very well to a site like Instagram (and its scale is
obviously immense).

A Facebook page would also be ideal if you can or want to invest the time to
cultivate it (a lot more work vs posting occasional media content to the other
sites).

Google isn't dying per se as a highly valuable source of traffic, but things
have changed a lot in the last five or six years. Google search as a traffic
source no longer occupies the overwhelming position that it used to, and that
is going to continue to weaken vs everything else collectively.

------
Grue3
Idea: allow people to order add-ons to their monthly packages (something
relatively cheap like manga, magazines, etc.). You can order it automatically
from Amazon Japan with free domestic shipping. So people could get their candy
+ whatever stuff they need from Japan, while saving on shipping costs.

~~~
jstarfish
I've run something similar to this. It has many problems, especially in the
international shipping arena.

Suppose I sell a box of candy that I make a comfortable profit on. You want me
to receive, store, and repackage a book that I don't make any money on to the
order. I'm just adding something to your existing order and doing you a favor,
right?

So I send you a box of candy and a book. The shipment gets lost in the mail /
held indefinitely in customs / destroyed / stolen. You don't subrogate Amazon
over the missing book (they did their job; I received it), you subrogate _me_
for both the book AND the candy. I take on a lot of additional responsibility
and work for no payoff (and often losing money in the process).

Not to mention the changing shipping costs, bizarre object handling and the
look on your face when I tell you that car-sized stuffed panda or pallet of
Calorie Mate you bought and shipped to my warehouse added $200 in shipping
charges to your $20 candy order. The reality of the situation hits you and now
you don't want either. Then I lose a candy sale, and have the pleasure of
storing and handling your giant Amazon order/return.

The alternative is adding a hefty handling fee to the cost of add-on items,
but then using me as a middleman likely ends up costing more than just buying
it directly. Then the social media accusations of price gouging on shipping
start making the rounds. "My god, how could they charge $200 to ship a stuffed
panda!" It's bad for business.

This model only really works when you have a friend over there who can send
you stuff. When something gets lost, it sucks, but it's _your_ problem, not
your friend's. The dynamic changes when your friend is a business-- everything
becomes _their_ problem. It's not worth the trouble.

There are dedicated repackaging services out there whose logistics operate at
much better scale than a company whose primary focus is retail.

------
zeeZ
> Another major hit was that all the packages we were sending to Germany
> started bouncing back. After this continued for several shipments, I decided
> just not to ship to Germany any more.

I guess that explains why I only ever received one package from my gift code.

Is that still a thing? Because when I open the website from Germany it says:

> $29 monthly with free shipping even to Germany.

~~~
bemmu
I've sent refunds for the missed packages to Germany. If you haven't gotten a
refund, please contact bemmu@candyjapan.com. This Germany thing happened very
recently, I'll update the site to reflect it.

 _Update: Just changed it, should update when the CDN cache expires.
Incidentally noticed I also had "East Germany" in my country list, oops :D_

~~~
jsjohnst
Have you thought about offering a box subscription of just one kind of
Japanese candy? I’d gladly pay up to US$50/month to get Japanese KitKats sent
to me as would some friends. I’m sure we aren’t alone, but not sure total
market size of course or if it’d be worth it for you. Japanese KitKats are
already seasonal in flavors, so makes doing a variety box even easier. Hope
you’ll consider it!

~~~
delhanty
Japanese Green Tea KitKats seem very popular.

I've been asked for them before back in the United Kingdom.

Now, in Hawaii - we put 10 bags in the suitcase because we'd been asked to
bring them.

~~~
jsjohnst
There’s literally hundreds of flavors of Japanese KitKats. I know of probably
over a dozen different varieties which are green tea based.

------
rwmj
I've said this before, but a twice-monthly subscription to sweets is too much
sugar. If it was once every 3 months then I'd consider subscribing.

~~~
bemmu
Good idea, could be worth trying to let people select different frequencies,
which practically would mean just skipping the packages in between.

~~~
amelius
Or: let people rate the candy. Then send the ones people love most. I.e., a
"best of Japanese candy" package.

By the way, when you've discovered candy that you like a lot, how do you order
more of it?

~~~
appleiigs
You'd cancel the subscription and order the favorite candy from amazon :(.

My friend received a selection of wine each month from the local store. After
a while his tastes narrowed to a specific grape. Cancelled his subscription
and now he goes directly to the store to get those wines. Candy Japan needs to
work on retention.

------
chaostheory
> What went wrong? This year I didn't have as much to blog about. In 2016 I
> had five popular posts (1 2 3 4 5), while in 2017 I only managed two (1 2).
> The posts tend to send a lot of high-quality traffic, so the impact was
> bigger than you might expect. I haven't figured out how to invent posts from
> thin air when I simply have nothing new to share.

benmu if you're reading, what about doing shorter but more regular posts on
life in Japan from your family's or just your perspective?

(That being said, I'm much worse than you on blog posts; something I will
correct starting now.)

> Tried paid YouTube ads, and while I did get some subscribers, in the end
> they were just too expensive to keep running. Tweaking the ads was very time
> consuming and expensive (but fun).

Instead of paying for Youtube ads, why not just do your own candy videos
instead?

------
RulingWalnut
I was actually thinking about canceling the service (trying to save a little
more money + eat healthier) but I really love articles like this so I'll stay
on for at least a few more months :)

I would say for me, the personal story is a big selling point. You're just a
guy who moved to Japan and started this service as opposed to some faceless
conglomerate. The new landing page is much nicer but maybe add some of the
stuff in the "Who runs Candy Japan?" page to the landing?

------
kuschku
> Another major hit was that all the packages we were sending to Germany
> started bouncing back. After this continued for several shipments, I decided
> just not to ship to Germany any more.

Have you ever figured out what was up with that? That sounds like something is
going wrong with the Zoll. Normally, sending products to all EU countries
should work the same.

------
manuelmagic
Hi, I just checked your site and I noticed you are improving the UI of the web
site as I suggested you on Twitter a while ago: now there are images on the
pages “check your email for link” and “thank you” page after a subscription.
Nice!

Furthermore, about the photos you added on the home page, having good photos
of the products you are selling (like examples of older boxes) is a huge
improvement. IMHO you did the right thing having them shot professionally.
Most of your competitors already had photos of candies, and I finally
subscribed to your service mostly because I finally could see in advance
examples of what (and how many of them) I will get in the mail.

So, keep going and best of luck! Bye

P.S.: thank you for the discount code in the article :)

------
marek12886
Nice story! Thank you for sharing. A few thoughts:

1) when is the last time you sat down with new and existing customers to see
their reaction to getting their physical boxes? You might get a lot of good
insights of how exciting (or not) the existing experience is of receiving the
candy. How does that change between the 1st and 10th box a customer receives?

2) why are people churning? Do you have a prioritized list of reasons? Not
what they said (most users don’t actually want to offend you or your business)
but what their real reasons were for canceling?

3) keep in mind that the real product is the box with candies. The website is
just for sales. Yes, SEO is definitely important to get new subscribers, but
to improve your product you have to improve the box or the offerings around
it.

4) pricing. I noticed that the lowest offering of $29/month is rather
expensive for a novelty purchase. How much experimentation have you done
around testing lower price points with less frequent shipments? This could
help with acquisition and retention.

I’ll be happy to help you understand how to look at retention, basic AARR
analysis, interview customers, etc. just let me know.

------
senko
Bemmu, you mentioned you tried YT ads. Have you tried to build an audience on
YT? For example with unwrapping / “reviews” of some of the candies.

I know there are tons of people watching similar things (though my 1st hand
exp is just seeing how my kid wants to spend infinite amount of time watching
surprise eggs unwrapping).

Just a hunch, but that might have a bigger ROI than ads.

Thanks for the writeup, love the openness!

~~~
bemmu
I was discouraged from doing this after having someone make such a video that
generated millions of views, but no sales at all
([https://www.candyjapan.com/behind-the-scenes/sales-
results-f...](https://www.candyjapan.com/behind-the-scenes/sales-results-from-
getting-3-million-views-on-youtube)). _(Just noticed that video has since been
removed for "violating community guidelines", I wonder what's up with that)_

But I'm still a bit motivated to make more videos, because at 10k subscribers
you get to visit the Roppongi YouTube space :-) Here's the old channel we
haven't really updated in a long time:
[https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCAWrpxBNP8LukXGd4xQIDxg](https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCAWrpxBNP8LukXGd4xQIDxg)

~~~
guildenstern
I wouldn’t discount YouTube based on that experience. That channel looks to be
one of the channels that drives a lot of views through children, specifically,
children watch and watch and watch these videos on TVs (driving up the
viewcounts) but aren’t engaged, they aren’t going to convert to customers. You
may wish to try more targeted channels, i.e channels with an engaged audience
of people who like Japanese culture. A video with 1,000 views to people who
are enamoured with Japanese culture will perform significantly better than
that video.

------
pryelluw
Every time the year update comes around I have the same I question (first time
posted):

Why not have a cosplayer (preferably a lady) (dressed in costume) review the
candy and post that to YouTube? I mean, this can be done for cheap ($75-100
per video or so).

~~~
Pfhreak
Why?

~~~
pryelluw
Fair question. I've made some basic audience assumptions. These are:

\- people who buy Japanese candy also like other Japanese items

\- people who buy Japanese candy also like the Japanese culture

\- people who know about Japanese candy are within a certain age range.

\- people within that age range that know about Japanese candy have also
purchased some

\- people who enjoy the Japanese culture that fa within the age range of those
who like the candy may also potentially enjoy Japanese pop culture

\- people who enjoy that pop culture enjoy consuming media about it

\- people who enjoy consuming the media have adopted newer platforms (YouTube
vs tv).

\- most of these people are male

A show with a cosplayers who talks about Japanese candy in a memorable way
seems to fit these assumptions.

Why a female cosplayer? Sex sells.

------
itake
I traveled all over asia with very little issues with using my Chase credit
card, but when I went to purchase candyjapan for a Xmas gift, my purchase was
insta-denied by Chase.

it was almost like the banks have flagged your merchant account as fraudulent.

------
evanb
You mention you haven't expanded. Have you considered also doing Japanese
stationery / office supplies? All the best tools I've got came from my one
trip to Japan :)

~~~
bemmu
I tried that actually, releasing Pen Japan at one point and had a few
subscribers as well. Then I realized I can't really appreciate nice stationery
myself. I would need to hire someone to curate it. The quality of the service
was poor, so I decided not to go on with it.

~~~
evanb
Ah, well that was my one idea :P

It's also hard in that: once I have one awesome Japanese stapler, how many
more do I need? For me the answer was just 1: a staple-free stapler. Then I
was saturated.

------
codinghorror
Aw that is a bummer, I subscribed in 2017 and love the Service!

------
LV-426
Interesting article, and good to know you're still operating despite the
problems.

> All those new subscribers beyond the first 800 were actually fakes who had
> subscribed with stolen credit card numbers [...] a lot of shipping addresses
> turned out to be fake as well

I don't know if this was already discussed in previous years, but this sounds
like a rival (either established or wanting to copy your model).

Edit: https

~~~
the-dude
Small charges on stolen credit cards are usually to test if the card is still
valid.

Hence charities are popular to test on too.

~~~
bemmu
I have long stopped telling people whether their charge worked if an order
looks suspicious, to prevent them from getting this information. So that
wouldn't work now.

~~~
the-dude
I am not sure I follow, could you clarify? You do send a confirmation after
sign up I presume?

~~~
bemmu
Well I can't say "your payment was processed successfully", because that would
give information to people who want to test cards. Rather I manually read
through the orders, and only contact people if something went wrong with their
payment AND the order doesn't look suspicious.

~~~
the-dude
Are you on Stripe?

------
ddoran
I appreciate your occasional updates posted here. They're always interesting.

> "This year I didn't have as much to blog about ... The posts tend to send a
> lot of high-quality traffic, so the impact was bigger than you might expect.
> I haven't figured out how to invent posts from thin air when I simply have
> nothing new to share."

This obviously seems like a lost opportunity. If you want to sustain the
business, you simply have to write more posts, as a start. I visit Japan for
two weeks every year and find the culture endlessly fascinating. Searching
here for mentions of Japan [1], the most popular is yours, but not a business
update, rather your post on the Japanese writing system [2]. Ignore the news
stories and look at all those other posts about Japan posted by others. These
are Japan topics that this community found interesting (I hope you promote to
other communities). You could write posts about coffee culture, beer culture,
Izakaya's, ex-pat life, other one-person businesses, life in Japan, J-pop even
k-pop, heck even the McDonald's menu in Japan vs elsewhere etc etc. Of course
the link to candy is tangential but a blog on entrepreneurial life / life in
Japan would attract Japanophiles who I expect would be interested in regular
candy packs from Japan. But why just focus on candy as the income. Why not
become a go-to guy for Japanese culture through the eyes of a Westerner? You
wouldn't be the first but you have a unique viewpoint. What about adding a
podcast. Building an audience, listing on Patreon. Just some thoughts.

I also have some comments about your website vs your competitor, presumably
[3].

* On Safari, when I type in "candy japan", the Siri suggestion is your competitor's, despite the search term basically being your domain name. You have work to do on SEO.

* Your competitor's photos of their offerings are front and center. Personally that draws me in immediately. Your photo is at the bottom of your page. You are literally burying the lede

* Your competitor has a time-limited call to action at the top of their page "Free Shipping even to United States! Next box subscription closes in: You have 4 Days left to get the next box!"

* Your competitor has great testimonials. Do you have social media contests? Promote use of a hashtag / instagram posting so you can easily cultivate for your page?

* This is probably an error, but when I click on your home page link "Past Boxes", I expected to see great photos of your past boxes. Social media pics and videos from happy users etc. Instead the very first text on the Past Boxes page is the post linked above with the text "This was another tough year for Candy Japan, with many factors combining to a sharp decline in subscriber numbers." I wanted to check out photos of amazing Japanese candy I can order but now I'm just bummed out.

* There are so many things your competitor is doing that you are not. Check out how easy he makes it for reviewers to get a free copy. Check out the reviews on his website. Being copied sucks but fight back. Take their ideas and improve upon them. Stay one step ahead.

* We're just through the holiday season in the West. How many parents were hunting for last minute gifts for kids (or adults). This would have been amazing gift and yet I see nothing on your front page that's marketing to "last minute gifts", "last minute xmas gifts for children" etc. A number of magazine newsletters I subscribed to had features on "last minute gifts", most of which were ticket, voucher or coupon based. How much outreach did you do?

I'm not being critical. You've done a lot to get here and are now facing
challenges. Meet them head on. There is _so much_ more you can do. Not
everything will work, but some will.

As it happens, I have a relation whose birthday it is in January. I'm going to
prove my own point and buy her a subscription from your site. I enjoy your
updates and salute your success to date. I wish you the very best going
forward.

[1] -
[https://hn.algolia.com/?query=japan&sort=byPopularity&prefix...](https://hn.algolia.com/?query=japan&sort=byPopularity&prefix&page=0&dateRange=all&type=story)
[2] - [https://www.candyjapan.com/口](https://www.candyjapan.com/口) [3] -
[http://www.japancandybox.com](http://www.japancandybox.com)

------
egze
Maybe blog posts with candy reviews might bring in some traffic?

~~~
bemmu
If we wrote those, where could they be shared to?

------
agopaul
It seems you have a high churn rate among your subscribers. Have you ever
investigated that? An automated plain text email asking for feedback or a
survey after someone unsubscribed would probably do it, though I guess you
probably tried this already.

------
mherrmann
Are your customers people who already know Japanese candy, but simply miss it
because they're abroad? Or is Japanese candy new to them and your service is a
way for them to try something new? With the temporary surge in search traffic,
it sounds like it's mostly "new" people. In that case, my hunch would be that
a subscription for a "novel" experience does not make sense. I would
(personally) try to offer other novelty items as part of the subscription (eg.
other Japanese cultural products such as Mangas, or candy from other countries
if feasible). Just my 2¢ of course. It's your business and I know nothing
about it.

~~~
mherrmann
And it sounds like you might want to invest in SEO. Your article says you
dropped in relevance but does not mention whether you are addressing this
problem already.

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bluedino
I never got the subscription services like CrateJoy. It's nice for a one-time
gift, kind of like a grab bag. But once you've gotten a couple boxes, what's
the point? You've discovered the brands/items you like, and it's easy to go
out and buy them at regular prices (some of those crates are $35 for $10 worth
of stuff)

Something that you can control and sell at a lower price than I can buy (cheap
razors, for example) is a different story.

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drchiu
This is a bummer indeed. I’ve noticed a few businesses that did decently well
around 2015, peaking, and declining into a slow death sort of thing. From what
I read here, this seems to be happening and will likely get worse in 2018. It
might be time to pivot into something else entirely.

~~~
bemmu
I agree. This isn't the first project I've had where I've been riding a wave
up and down. Many things have a limited lifespan, but can often still be worth
doing.

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wingerlang
> even to Sweden

Is Sweden typically a country where things aren't shipped to for free?

~~~
the-dude
For me it said The Netherlands.

~~~
container
And for me, Finland. I guess it picks the client location the same way online
ads do.

~~~
rootlocus
Funny thing, I was thinking "I bet they don't ship to Romania" but then I saw
"even to Romania" and was both happy and somewhat disappointed that even they
knew Romania doesn't get much love. Makes me feel a little better that
everyone's getting the same template.

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GordonS
Are there any other micro-businesses that do a similar end of year review?

I used to read patio11's when he ran Bingo Card Creator, and find the Candy
Japan reviews similarly interesting.

~~~
paulcole
Pinboard has done them in the past.

[https://blog.pinboard.in/2017/07/eight_years_of_victory/](https://blog.pinboard.in/2017/07/eight_years_of_victory/)

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carlos_rpn
I wonder if the first season of the anime Dagashi Kashi in 2016 and the next
season early 2018 had or will have any impact on it.

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rootsudo
Another year has gone by.

I haven't done a company, or anything, really.

I should just do something. Hmm.

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hemantv
Did you try any of the smart fraud prevention? Like Siftscience?

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yipopov
Let's be honest, weeaboos make a poor target market to base any business on.
No real purchasing power other than the allowance they get from their parents
or perhaps a burger flipping wage, and I'd imagine most of them just pirate
their cartoons.

