Well while I'm sure that the english teacher thing is pretty reliable (no pun intended) the whole "you need a grade" issue is a pain in the ass, so I was thinking about what else could I do in japan to keep my feet dry and my belly full, and I came to this idea: What about being an importer/exporter in japan? I know about a lot of guys making good money out of this. Both selling crazy stuff in ebay (like dolls and pocky) to some expensive stuff like car tunning hardware. But it seems that the japanese are buying western stuff too What I need to know is what I need to do this in japan: I just post the thing in ebay and send it to america or europe? do I need some special license to do so? how much are the import taxs in japan?
Well I'm not sure you could make your entire living just on import/export, maybe more of a side buisness. The problem with making it your full time job is that there are loads of really established shops or ebayers doing exactly this right now, who have big set ups and staff. It used to be the case of finding a niche, like for the the sake of argument, Himeya started with Bishy games. If you can think of something that is not exported from Japan then maybe you are on to a winner. (Plus visa may be a little hard to get!) FYI I actually sell stuff to Japan at the moment. (without giving it away - as it is my cash cow!) I sell certain expensive British fashion "items" to a mate of mine in Osaka who sells them in a shop in shinsaibashi. Trust me, you can make a hell of a lot of money, I basically over double my money on everything I sell. But that is only a side project, even if I did it full time I could not live of it.
The gravy train is long gone. No more can you make a 300% profit on used games. Even then, it would've taken a lot of time/money to support yourself fully on this, as you could only sell X amount of pieces per month. These days, you're going to have to undercut the big shops (Lik Sang, Play Asia, etc.) by a good $5 USD per unit to get customers. This is going to cut into your profit margins. I've thought of opening a shop in Japan, but it just flat out takes a lot of time for little reward. You can work half the time and make more money teaching English (the sad truth, and why many never quit teaching). As for selling US crap in America, games are beyond nitche. Messe Sanno has an "import" shop, and there's one other in Akihabara, and that's about it. Hardly enough interest to support a healthy import/export business. Vintage clothes are a much healthier and in demand product, but competition is 1000% tougher. You're also going to need a visa... you can't self-sponsor right out of the gates (and probably can't down the road either) so you'll need a full-time job (or get married) and THEN, you can work on the side business.
K but most of them sell at rip-off prices, like the dude at J-list. Plus a friend of mine told me there's good money in the car tunning bussines, since in japan you can find some bargains that are quite espensive back in the states or europe. Yeah I know, that or going as a refugee. BTW, I asked this on another thread but since nobody wrote back heres again: Do other more unusual lenguages like french, spanish or german pay more than english? how much more? cuz I could do some of them.
1: Do they really sell them at those prices, or just list them there? 2: How many units are they selling at these prices 3: What are you comparing them to? The streets of Japan are not paved with retro games, contrary to popular belief. You can get stuff on Ebay cheaper than Akihabara sometimes. There are certain laws in the US which make it impossible to make money when sending to America. There are many people that do this for the UK and Australia. I knew of two people that actually make their living on this. One to the UK (he's there most of the time) and one in Australia, whom I only knew briefly. Again - lots of people do this, it's not like you'll be inventing the wheel (pun intended). No, they don't. You'd also be going up against native speakers, with names to match their region (which makes a huge difference). Unless you can speak one of the langauges natively, and have a name that makes you look like you're from there, get ready for disappointment. There are no discrimination laws in Japan -- I saw people get turned down from teaching jobs b/c they had an asian or hispanic name. I can only assume the same would hold true for Johnny Smith trying to teach French.
K, the guys at J-list sell mostly japanese stuff, not console games. And my theory of selling western games in japan comes from a guy that got a NeoGeo AES with a decent catalog by selling his medium size Nes collection in japan. And I know I didnt invent the wheel, if I heard of this bussines is becos somebody is already on it. Is not that I'm going for the unexpected. About being native and discrimination, but lets say a mexican like the other guy who posts here goes to japan, wouldnt he be paid more for teaching spanish since there less amount of spanish teachers compared to english ones? Dunno, is logical capitalism if you ask me.
He would most likely get paid less money b/c he's a Mexican, if there was any change in pay at all. That, and there are less people teaching Spanish b/c there are less people wanting to learn it. A lot less. If you wanted to do an online shop selling J-stuff, it is definitely possible. You'll just need the same thing you'd need for any business. Capital to buy the stuff, customers, a Paypal account or merchant account (this is up to 4% per transaction, FYI), and if you're smart, a company name and a good accountant. Of course, if you just want to make a little on the side, you will only need some patience.
becos he is a mexican? that sucks! And I tough japanese liked that thing, Tango, and that's spanish... Anyways, well back to the teaching bussiness then...
As for the cars, while it's very difficult to make money shipping/selling complete, late-model Japanese cars to the US from Japan (as they can't be legally driven here, unlike in Australia), there is a TON of money to be made in parts. OEM parts like body panels, engines, front clips, etc... are a fairly good moneymaker, but the best sellers are going to be the aftermarket goods. For some reason, in Japan, there is a stigma against buying used aftermarket parts, hence places like Up Garage, which blow out stuff at insane prices ($30 for a Nardi steering wheel, $5 for a 180sx garnish piece??). This stuff fetches ridiculous prices over here, but you have to know exactly what to buy and what to leave alone. Particularly, bringing anything over here that's already available in the US (i.e. chuki S13 pop-up front end), wont' make any money, but bringing over the projector-light S13 coupe front end will make you a mint if you can buy up 30 of them and ship them in a container. Another angle is the importation of vintage japanese cars that can be legally driven in the US under a "historic" registration, i.e. anything 25+ years old. There is a growing interest in vintage Japanese cars within the US tuner community, especially for cars that were never sold here at all (i.e. PGC10 Skyline, PGC110 Skyline, old Presidents, Cimas, Honda S600 and S800, etc...) As time marches forward and the turbocharged beasts of the 1980s begin to fall under the 25+ year bracket, there will be a lot of money to be made selling stuff like DR30 Skylines, Laurel Turbos, FJ20ET S12 Silvias, et cetera. Again, you need to know exactly what to buy, otherwise you'll lose your shirt.
That's what I was talking about in the first post, but as you can see the guys in japan dont agree with this bussines. Honestly I think I could make more than teaching enlish by just selling these parts in eBay.
