In Japan, the Kit Kat Isn’t Just a Chocolate

Spending 50% of my time in an investment office in Japan - at least one secretary I know loves Kit Kat and Reese’s

Same. Lived in Japan, rarely saw anyone outside of tourists buying them. Combinis and grocery stores hardly ever feature them (unless those stores get tourist traffic).

Same observation here, before my first trip I expected Kit Kat to be huge there

I saw a very popular seasonal KitKat stand within Seibu department store when I was visiting Japan, and I didn't notice any other tourist-looking people around. Is it possible that it's just not popular in the convenience store market, but is more popular in competition with all of the higher-end sweets people were constantly giving me, talking about, and eating while I was there?

Can second this. I travel to Tokyo often and have purchased Kit Kat to bring back home. Mostly tourists buy these, none of my local japanese friends do

I bought a Kit Kat Chocolatory gift box large for 45 USD as a gift for our anniversary (my partner & me). The S&H was 25 USD.

It was OK, an interesting experience. Just not worth that amount of money (YMMV and the surprise effect was worth it). It contained about 5 different types of Kit Kat (maple & strawberry, green tea, butter, ..pistachio?) including 4 Sublime Bitter. The latter were, IMO, ace but I already regularly eat pure sprinkles and pure chocolate spread and I am already used to Belgian bonbons and German/Swiss chocolate. I bought it for the Japanese twist...

Strangely, a month or 2 after I received it (it was stored as a present, meanwhile) PayPal send me an e-mail that the payment wasn't claimed and I got my money back from PayPal (???). Peculiar experience.

It's a not so uncommon omiyage to buy. Each region has their own flavors, so you are more likely to get them from co-workers than friends.

There was also the marketing ploy around 15? years ago that they did a play on Kit Kat to be きっとかつ/きっと勝つ/kitto katsu for students that wanted to feel like they would surely win a game or pass a test.

Speaking of tourist candy, what's with M&M stores being at all the off-broadway/times square ripoffs in every major city?

Tourists, yes, but to a large extent internal tourism due to the tradition of bringing back regional snacks for friends, family and coworkers. If you visit the gift shops along the highways in Japan they are stacked high with kitkat boxes of the local specialty flavours.

I have been pleasantly surprised with Japanese takes on American desserts and pastries. They tone down the sugar and elevate the texture and flavor imho.

I can get matcha flavored KitKats at a local store here in the US.

That has not been good for my waistline.

I was most amused to find a "Men's" Pocky in Japan. I couldn't believe I'd been eating gender-neutral Pocky the entire time before.

Tomato flavored pocky is so good

FWIW Pocky are called Mikado in the UK (made under license from Glico by Kraft AFAICT, [0]). They're marketed as quirky [and] Japanese, rather like [1]. But, I think they only do one flavour.

Are the flavoured ones the same thin breadstick with different flavoured coatings? Are they all chocolate based?

To me they're vaguely reminiscent of Corinthians[2], which are rather like the inner part of a kit-kat too. Corinthians used to be served in ice-cream in UK restaurants.

[0] https://www.otakunews.com/Article/1451/is-mikado-pocky-a-tas...

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Mikado

[2] https://shop.countdown.co.nz/shop/productdetails?stockcode=5...

Matcha Tea Pocky >> Whatever.