"Dedicated to Favorite Idol Members and Characters"
Significant Decrease in Chocolates Given to Partners
In Japan, where Valentine's Day is celebrated, a craze for 'Oshi Choco (推しチョコ·Oshi Choco)' is sweeping the nation this year, where people prepare chocolates not for their romantic partners but for their favorite idol members or anime characters. This shift in consumption towards personal happiness rather than others has been positively received for changing the dynamics of Valentine's Day.
On the 14th, TBS reported on the rapidly emerging Valentine's Day keyword, Oshi Choco, by visiting shopping districts such as Ginza in central Tokyo.
Oshi Choco released by Merry Chocolate Company. You just need to print your favorite photo on the acrylic plate and chocolate and attach it. (Photo by Merry Chocolate Company)
Oshi Choco is a concept where customers prepare chocolates for their favorite celebrities or characters, offered as a DIY product that customers can decorate themselves. Merry Chocolate Company, which officially released this product, introduces ways to enjoy Oshi Choco as follows: First, think hard about your favorite. Then select the best photo or image of your favorite, print it to fit the size of the chocolate, and decide where to stick it on the chocolate wrapper. After attaching it in the right place, decorate it using the included stickers. Finally, look at the completed chocolate and wish happiness for both your favorite and yourself.
If there is no suitable way to deliver the chocolate to your favorite, or if your favorite exists in the 2D world and is hard to meet, you can share a photo of the finished chocolate on social networking services (SNS). This allows sharing joy with other fans who have the same interests. Merry Chocolate Company also considered that fandoms or favorites have representative colors, so they expanded customers' choices by offering nine different wrapper colors.
The styles vary as well. The same company separately released an Oshi Choco featuring a human-shaped chocolate sinking into a pile of pink bead chocolates. The company promotes it by saying, "It symbolizes love so deep that it sinks into a chocolate swamp. If you place the acrylic stand in front, you can completely immerse yourself in the swamp of your favorite." Oshi Choco is released in various forms and can currently be seen everywhere from department stores to 100-yen shops selling inexpensive items, with some locations reportedly experiencing shortages.
The emergence of Oshi Choco is regarded as having changed the dynamics of Valentine's Day. According to a Valentine's Day awareness survey announced on the 17th of last month by the department store group JR Takashiyama, 12% of respondents said they buy Valentine's Day chocolates "for their favorite." This far surpassed reasons such as "for someone you like" (4%) or "for colleagues and others out of obligation" (3%). Whereas in the past chocolates were purchased for others, now people are opening their wallets for consumption entirely for themselves.
A JR Takashiyama representative explained, "This year, the highest response to the question of how much people would spend on chocolates for themselves was 'I don't care about the amount.' The number of people enjoying Valentine's Day as a reward for themselves has increased significantly."
Previously, in 2018, Godiva Japan attracted attention by criticizing the Valentine's Day culture of reluctantly preparing chocolates for workplace relationships in an advertisement published in Nihon Keizai Shimbun (Nikkei) titled "Japan, let's stop obligation chocolates."
The economic media Toyo Keizai stated, "In Japan, where events are taken seriously, there is a deep-rooted custom of giving something on holidays, events, and anniversaries. However, the custom of giving chocolates to the opposite sex on Valentine's Day may soon disappear." It added, "Many people feel exhausted by the Valentine's Day sales competition or that it does not fit their lifestyle. The key will be how the industry approaches consumers with future strategies."
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