Why is fast food more expensive in japan

Question

there is a guy that I know who payed 936 yen at starbucks for a medium coffee and a cinammon roll. So why is it so expensive?

Answer 1

1. Because everything is expensive in Japan.

2. Dollar is getting weaken these days.

Answer 2

Your friend overpaid, a medium ("tall") coffee and a cinnamon roll at a Starbucks in Japan should cost roughly 500 yen. Oddly, that's about as much as it costs in the US.

Answer 3

If you are talking about Tokyo specifically, it is the second most expensive place to live (behind Moscow, interestingly). You are going to run into that in most of the bigger cities (and I know they pay for their gasoline by the liter, so its REALLY expensive), but stuff will be much cheaper in the smaller towns. I think some of it has to do with it being an island nation and importers must use ships and planes to get supplies in, which is a much more expensive options compared to land transportation.

Answer 4

Japan is just expensive like that.

Answer 5

Almost everything food-wise is imported to Japan. The country has little space to grow the amount of food required for sustenance in the country, so the cost of importing/shipping has to be included in any food eaten.

Moreover, if it's a "foreign" restaurant or coffee place like Starbucks, that's a luxury, so will cost more to begin with, just like if people in the US went to a foreign store to buy food.