Saving Yen: Cheap & Easy 第1

Cheap & Easy 第1 - Don Quixote

Who doesn't like things cheap and easy??
The answer is NO ONE. And when living in one of the most expensive cities in the world for expatriates, so it's best to get a deal whenever you can. In this post, I'm gonna to try to lay out a couple points for saving money on household goods.

Keep an eye out for sale days.
A lot of supermarkets in Japan have certain days picked out as sale days. One market near my place usually has sales on Tuesday (pretty arbitrary), and AEON's also tend to have Tues/Wed sales.

Don Quixote seems to use a 'time-sale' type method where, instead of choosing one day for sales, sales with run for a few days for select items before switching to sales on different items. Also, since Don Quixote sells groceries (mostly processed food), clothes, electronics, cosmetics, medicine, bikes and brand items, you can find sales on a wide range of items!

Unfortunately, because sale items rotate fairly often, they may sell out pretty quickly and if it's a limited run item, it won't be coming back. Sad Panda :<

Tip: If you want updates, join Don Quixote's mailing list (Jpn only), which will also allow you to print out coupons!

I love sale items :)

Definitely pick up household goods on sale days!
That photo was from a recent shopping trip on Saturday (I usually avoid Sat. crowds but the sales are good!). I was able to pick up all of these items for under 2000 yen (about 19USD) which is great because a lot of these items are things you don't pick up often! If they had been regular price, I think this trip could have been 3000 yen + easy.

Cleaning supplies tend to be especially pricey in Japan, but if you can pick up 詰替え用 (tsume kae you - refill), it'll help your budget! I would say the median regular price for all these items is about 348 yen (which would bring the total to about 1740 yen, almost 2000 yen without the other non-sale items!!), but I was able to pick them up for about 120 yen.

Everything I picked up, sale and non-sale.

You might be wondering what a few yen matter, but why not make every yen count? With the consumption (sales) tax increase from 5% to 8%, it does not seem like the cost of living in Japan will become anymore reasonable.

I have a few other tips for saving yen, but I'll save those for another post. Trying to keep it short and sweet these days! :P

★Peaces★