Starbucks gets a jump on Japan’s fukubukuro New Year’s tradition.
With Halloween over, many companies in Japan are now getting ready to kick off their Christmas promotions. Always-prepared Starbucks Japan, though, is thinking even one step farther ahead, as they’re already in the lucky bag mood.
Lucky bags, or fukubukuro, as they’re called in Japanese, are a New Year’s tradition in Japan, in which stores and brands sell mystery grab bags of their popular items at discounted prices on the first few days of the new year in January. But because Starbucks Japan’s lucky bags are in such high demand, they’re offered as pre-orders, which are set to open at 10 a.m. on November 4.
As is the norm, Starbucks isn’t revealing everything that’ll be in the bag, but they are already showing off the bag itself. While most fukubukuro are just simple disposable paper bags, the 2026 Starbucks Japan lucky bag is a stylish cloth tote bag that deftly straddles the line between casual coziness and relaxed stylishness, essentially the same atmosphere Starbucks creates for its coffeehouses.
Inside the bag is a lucky bag limited-edition stainless steel drink bottle and a 250-gram (8.8-ounce) pack of Pike Place Roast ground coffee. You also get an assortment of gift certificates to be used in Starbucks branches, one for a pack of Starbucks coffee beans up to 2,000 yen (US$13.30) in value, seven drink gift certificates, and six “food trial” certificates, presumably for sample-sized food items. Each lucky bag also contains three other pieces of Starbucks merch, randomly selected from lucky bag-limited and previously sold items, but the exact mix seems to vary from bag to bag, as Starbucks says that 1,000 lucky bags will include its new gray rhinestone stainless steel tumbler.
As for the design of the drink bottle, that’s still under wraps, though judging from Starbucks’ impressive track record in producing snazzy drinkware, it’s hard to imagine it being anything less than charming-looking.
The 2026 Starbucks lucky bag is priced at 8,800 yen, and not only do you not need to go to a physical Starbucks location to buy the lucky bag, you won’t need to pick it up in-person either, as home delivery in the first week of January is included in the price. Rather than a first-virtually-come first-served basis, the bundle is being offered through a lottery system, with purchase privileges being awarded randomly to applicants who put in their entry between November 4 and 14, with full entry details available here.
Source, images: Starbucks Japan
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