Just in time for Valentine’s Day, food gifts marketer Harry and David on Jan. 29 launched a Japanese Website. The Japanese-language site will initially offer seven chocolate and nut gifts, selected based on their appeal to the Japanese consumer as well as meeting customs and import requirements.
Although Harry and David ships internationally to more than 102 countries, the new site is its first specific to a country and language, according to Nancy Tait, president/CEO of Harry and David’s Medford, OR-based parent company Bear Creek Corp. Tait said the Japanese market, with its strong gift-giving culture, was a “natural place for the company to expand.”
For certain, it’s a good time of year to be peddling chocolate gifts in Japan. Japanese consumers not only celebrate Valentine’s Day—when women are to give chocolates to men—they also have White Day on March 15, a holiday designed specifically for men to reciprocate with candy gifts for women.