Crane games are big hits with foreign tourists and Japanese kids, so Family Mart is happy to have them come in and play.
7-Eleven Japan has been grabbing a lot of attention recently, what with their matcha dessert burritos and their new luggage storage service for travelers. But rival Japanese convenience store chain Family Mart isn’t going to let itself be forgotten, and it’s announced that it plans to make a big push in adding crane games and coin-op video games to its stores.
The move comes as part of a shifting focus in how Family Mart branches use their floor space. Last year, Family Mart announced it would be phasing out the in-store eat-in spaces in many of its branches, and the chain also stopped selling print magazines at several thousands of its locations this past spring. At the same time, Family Mart wants its stores to have some sort of fun reason to stop by aside from just their selection of food, drinks, and daily sundries, and crane games are one of the ideas they’ve hit upon.
As shown in the promotional event video above, Family Mart’s crane games, which have already made their debut in select branches, are smaller than the full-sized units installed in dedicated arcades in Japan. These more compact machines can be stacked on top of each other, allowing for operators to stock a wider variety of prizes without taking up an obtrusive amount of space. Smaller crane machines like this are often encountered in shopping centers and tourist attractions, and sure enough, Family Mart says part of the decision to start adding more crane games to its stores is to meet demand from inbound foreign tourists, many of whom have playing crane games on their list of cool stuff they want to do on their trip to Japan.
As such, Family Mart says that many of the branches it’s looking to add crane games to are in big-city downtown areas, which are more likely to have a large number of foreign tourist customers. The chain says it wants more crane games in suburban areas too, though, where it hopes they’ll help attract families with kids. With the target markets being travelers and kids, not necessarily hardcore crane fans, the price per play will be a modest 100 yen (US$0.65).
In addition to crane games, Family Mart is also planning to start installing Pokémon Frienda video game machines in select stores. Not to be confused with mobile game Pokémon Friends, Pokémon Frienda is a coin-op arcade game, but the reliance on separately purchased physical cards as well as the required ability to read Japanese in order to play the game means that Pokémon Frienda machines will probably be relatively rare in the downtown, entertainment district Family Mart branches that are getting crane games to cater to inbound international travelers, and at the moment only two branches have the Pokémon machines (the Setagaya Yonchome and Showa Yakuhin Nishioshimaeki-mae branches, both in Tokyo).
Family Mart’s current plan is to expand crane games to 5,000 of its stores, or about one out of every three it has in Japan. With rival Lawson also recently getting into the crane game game, it’ll be interesting to see if 7-Eleven follows suit soon too.
Source: Family Mart, Teleasa News via Hachima Kiko
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