Are Tokyo Treat Boxes Worth it? | My Tokyo Treat Box Review
Looking for a Japanese candy subscription box?
Tokyo Treat boxes might be just what you’re looking for!
Japan is famous for having rather inventive candy flavours (wasabi KitKat, anyone?) which are almost impossible to get hold of outside the country.
Enter, Tokyo Treat.
Tokyo Treat is a monthly subscription box packed full of wacky and authentic Japanese snacks, and if you’re craving some tasty Japanese treats but can’t afford a plane ticket to Japan right now, Tokyo Treat was made for you.
Recently, I was lucky enough to be gifted the Sakura Matsuri Snackfest box (April 2024), and in this blog post, I’m going to reveal exactly what I thought of it.
In this Tokyo Treat review, I’m going to share what was inside my box, whether I think Tokyo Treat boxes are worth the money, how the subscriptions work, and what the shipping process is.
So, if you’re on the fence about signing up for a Tokyo Treat subscription, stick around, because this article may help you make your mind up!
Let’s get into it.
Are Tokyo Treat Boxes Worth It? | My Tokyo Treat Box Review
What is Tokyo Treat?
Tokyo Treat is one of the most popular Japanese subscription boxes on the market.
Every month, they pack 15-20 full-size Japanese snacks into their colourful boxes, and ship them out worldwide.
Back in 2015, Tokyo local Ayumi Chikamoto decided that she wanted to start sharing her favourite snacks with the world.
She was already introducing her foreign friends to Japanese snacks, but she wanted to do more.
Sitting on her living room floor in 2015, she created her first mystery snack box, and since then, Ayumi and her small team have shipped out millions of boxes to over 150 countries!
Sidenote: Ayumi Chikamoto also runs Sakuraco, another candy subscription box that focuses on Japanese tea traditions. You can read my review of Sakuraco boxes here.
Who are Tokyo Treat boxes for?
Tokyo Treat boxes are perfect for anyone who has been to Japan and is missing their favourite Japanese snacks, or people like me, who have never been but love to try new things!
If you don’t want to commit to a subscription, you can even buy individual boxes, making Tokyo Treat boxes a great gift idea for the Japanophile in your life.
Unlike Sakuraco boxes, which have a more elegant design, Tokyo Treat boxes are bold and colourful, designed for kids and adults alike.
How it works
What to expect in your box
Every Tokyo Treat box is filled with 15-20 products, as well as a 20-page Culture Guide that provides information about each snack, including allergen information, and whether the snacks are suitable for vegetarians (most are).
The snacks are varied, and include a mixture of sweet and savoury treats.
Examples of snacks you may receive include:
- Japanese soda
- Cakes, pastries
- Cookies
- Candy
- Crisps, corn puffs
- Chocolate
- Instant ramen
- Rice cakes, bread
- Jelly, pudding, desserts
- Anime snacks
Pricing
Tokyo Treat works on a a subscription model, meaning that as long as your subscription is active, you’ll receive a box each month.
The longer you subscribe for, the less you pay for each box, meaning a 12-month subscription is the best value for money.
Tokyo Treat do not send you an email when your subscription is about to renew, so if you don’t remember to cancel, you will be automatically charged for the next pay period (if you initially signed up for a 12 month subscription, this will be another 12 months).
I’d recommend setting an alarm in your calendar when your subscription is due to renew, so that you can cancel it if necessary!
Tokyo Treat prices are as follows:
- 1 month: $37.50
- 3 months: $35.50 (a saving of $6)
- 6 months: $33.50 (a saving of $24)
- 12 months: $32.50 (a saving of $60)
Shipping
Shipping costs are not included in the price of your Tokyo Treat box.
This can bring the overall cost up quite significantly, as you can expect to pay between $10.50 – 12.50 for each shipment.
To get Tokyo Treat shipped to the UK, you’ll pay $12.50 per box, with a delivery time of 2-14 days (my box arrived in just 3 days).
While this isn’t cheap, bear in mind that you’re paying for express shipping from Japan, and Tokyo Treat boxes tend to weigh over 1300g (2.86lbs) – that’s pretty weighty!
It’s worth noting that some countries do quality for free shipping with Surface Mail, although this takes 60-90 days. You can find the full list of countries here, but I’m going to go out on a limb and say that if you’re reading my blog, you probably don’t reside in one of the countries that qualifies for free shipping.
My Tokyo Treat Box
The theme of my Tokyo Treat box was ‘Sakura Matsuri Snackfest,’ which was similar to the theme of my Sakuraco box (‘A Night of Sakura’).
The Culture Guide for both boxes talked about the tradition of Yozakura (admiring the illuminated cherry blossom trees at night), while enjoying sakura festival foods, and I was interested to find out the similarities and differences between the two boxes.
The first thing I noticed was that my Tokyo Treat box was about 25% larger than my Sakuraco box, and it was absolutely packed full.
The design of the box was very different.
While the Sakuraco box had an elegant design with a deep mauve colour, Tokyo Treat was bright and bold, with large, Pop Art style graphics depicting various snacks.
On the inside of the lid, in bubble writing, were the words ‘Bite into Japan.’
Already, the vibe of the box was completely different to Sakuraco.
Snacks inside my Tokyo Treat box
KitKat Strawberry
The first thing that greeted me was a huge bag of mini strawberry-flavoured KitKats.
There were 10 bars in the bag, which I was super impressed with!
Initially, I didn’t think I’d be a fan of these, as I’m not mad about strawberries OR KitKats, but I actually really liked them!
I think it’s because these bars are made with white chocolate and have the tart flavour that you get from frozen strawberries – either way, they were delicious!
Sakura Cream Cake
A fluffy sponge cake with some cherry-flavoured cream sandwiched in the middle.
Personally, I found this to be a little dry, but then again, I find sponge cakes in general dry, so perhaps this was just not my kind of treat.
Platinum Sakura Sweet Tart
This was an interesting one.
This tart was almost like a flan, filled with a sweet paste made from white beans and infused with salted sakura leaves. I was expecting a stronger flavour, but it was very subtle.
Again, this wouldn’t be something I’d personally choose, but I enjoyed getting to try something so far removed from anything I’d find at home.
Koikeya Nori Shio Chips
I’m definitely more of a savoury person, so I was chuffed to see these umami seaweed chips in my box!
Perfectly crunchy and flavoured with seaweed and chilli oil, these were right up my street.
The bag was also large and much fuller than crisps that you buy in the UK!
Acerola Cherry Juice
Also in my Tokyo Treat box was a can of cherry juice!
I haven’t actually tried this yet, but I’ve never tried cherry juice before, so I was buzzing to get this in my box.
This also speaks to the variety of goodies that you may get in your Tokyo Treat box – most of the things in my Sakuraco box were quite similar, but Tokyo Treat does seem to have more of a variety of products.
Sakura Waffle Cookie
This light and crispy waffle cookie has a sweetened filling that is – you’ve guessed it – sakura-flavoured!
I wasn’t a big fan of this if I’m being honest. It was a little bland for my liking.
Sakura Karinto
Karinto is made by frying bits of dough and rolling them in sweet sugar crystals.
This karinto was made with sakura leaves, in-keeping with the theme of the box, and I really really liked these (which was a good job, as the bag was very big!).
They had a great crunch, and the sugar was almost like a subtle icing – soo good.
Premium Ghana
This large bag of chocolate squares with a truffle-like centre were also a very welcome sight in my Tokyo Treat box!
I especially loved that they were all individually-wrapped: I’m not someone who can sit and eat a large bag of chocolate in one go, so I like that I can go through this bag as slowly as I like, and the chocolates will stay fresh.
Glico Bisco Cracker
This small snack was a sandwich cookie with strawberry cream in the middle – it reminded me of the BN biscuits I used to eat as a child (tell me you don’t have the ad jingle in your head right now).
Strawberry Yoghurt Hard Candies
I mentioned earlier that I’m not the biggest fan of strawberries, but these strawberry yoghurt hard candies were really nice.
With an outer yoghurt coating and a tart strawberry centre, these reminded me a little bit of the white chocolate strawberries I received in my Sakuraco box!
Ramune Candy
This little bag of candy is a type of dagashi candy (like penny sweets!) that Japanese people eat as children.
Flavoured with lemon and shikuwasa (a citrus fruit from Okinawa), this candy is like a tablet that dissolves in your mouth – think Mini Fizzers or Love Hearts!
Yakisoba
I’m always buying instant noodles.
My cupboards are jam-packed with various ramen noodles, and so I was delighted to find this in my Tokyo Treat box!
Not only was it an entire meal rather than a small snack, but it was damn good as well.
Mini Caplico Stick
This iconic Japanese snack looks just like an ice cream cone.
The thin wafer is injected with a strawberry cream filling, and it’s sort of like an ice cream that doesn’t melt!
This was another snack that wasn’t to my taste, but it was fun to try – the texture was unlike anything I’ve tried before!
Curry Senbei Crackers
These mini rice crackers, flavoured with curry powder and chilli pepper, were much more up my street.
I’ve never had curry-flavoured rice crackers before, but they tasted just like I imagined they would – delicious.
Squid Rice Cracker
I was a bit dubious about this one, but as soon as I tried it, I couldn’t get enough of it!
This crunchy rice cracker was sprinkled with salt and squid-flavoured seasoning, and it was soo good.
My only criticism is that it was so small – I could have eaten a whole bag of these!
What I liked about my Tokyo Treat box
The variety of items
There was a huge variety of things in my box, both in category and flavour.
Seaweed, cherry blossom, strawberry, curry, squid, and lemon were all flavours that I found in my box, and it was fun to try them all.
Product types included soda, instant noodles, rice cakes, crisps, sweets, chocolates, and cakes, and flavours ranged from seaweed and squid to strawberry and cherry blossom.
Product size
The products were all generous sizes. I got 10 mini KitKats, and full-size packets of ramen and crisps.
One thing I didn’t like about my Sakuraco box was the fact that many of the items were bite-sized (for example, one of the items consisted of 3 cashew nuts), whereas the Tokyo Treat items felt much more substantial, for the most part.
No duplicates
Another thing I criticised about Sakuraco was that many of the items came in pairs, meaning that I only got to try 13 different things as opposed to the 20 that I was expecting.
In my Tokyo Treat box, every single product was unique, and I had a lot of fun trying all the different snacks.
Discovering new things
I loved being able to try new things that I would never usually be able to buy here in the UK!
While not everything was to my taste, that was all part of the fun of it, and I had such a fun time trying everything with my boyfriend.
What I didn’t like about my Tokyo Treat box
Not supporting small businesses
What I loved about Sakuraco was that by purchasing a box, you’re supporting small family businesses and local artisans.
Tokyo Treat, on the other hand, is all about big brands that don’t necessarily need more promotion.
Too much strawberry!
While the savoury snacks in my box all had distinct flavour profiles, the sweet things were mainly all strawberry-flavoured.
I understand that the theme of my box was sakura season, so I see why they went heavy on the strawberry, but it would have been nice to have a bit more variety, especially as I don’t personally enjoy strawberries.
Expensive shipping
While I totally understand that Tokyo Treat can’t control external shipping costs, there’s no denying that express shipping from Japan is expensive, and this really pushes the price of the boxes up.
As Tokyo Treat boxes are already on the pricey side, the shipping costs might be enough to put some people off.
Tokyo Treat Boxes | Final Thoughts
If you or a friend are obsessed with Japan, and you love snacks, you’ll love Tokyo Treat boxes.
I personally preferred this box to the Sakuraco box, as although the number of products inside the box was the same, there was a wider variety of things to try.
The products were also larger (for the most part), making the price of the box feel more justified.
While Tokyo Treat boxes aren’t cheap by any means, you have to remember that you’re getting a handpicked selection of products that all fit a certain theme – naturally, you’re going to pay more than what the products would cost in the supermarket.
Plus, the price point is comparable to other Japanese snack boxes out there.
If you want to buy your own Tokyo Treat box, just click here to visit their website!
That’s all for today, but as always, if you have any questions about Tokyo Treat, just reach out and ask in the comments section below!
Until next time,
XOXO
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