【Lucky Bag Roundup 2018】Yodobashi Camera offers up a tablet box of techie dreams

Popular retail chain Yodobashi Camera sets the bar high with their “Tablet Computer Dreams i” New Year’s gift box. 

Yodobashi Camera is the ultimate haven for lovers of electronics, big and small. Just walking past its shelves jam-packed with the latest and greatest in merchandise is enough to turn any modern techie into a sniveling, bright-eyed kid on Christmas morning again. Even its company president has been known to get in on the electronics fun by buying the only camera to go to the moon and back.

Our Japanese-language reporter K. Nagahashi is also a huge fan of the chain. This year he was determined to get his hands on one of the store’s coveted New Year’s gift boxes (their name for the ubiquitous “lucky bags” we’ve been covering this week). Since he lives on the northern Japanese island of Hokkaido, Nagahashi set out for his local branch, Yodobashi Camera Multimedia Sapporo, and was shocked upon arrival to discover that more than 80 people had already lined up by 2:50 am on New Year’s Day. Apparently the below-freezing temperature and the fact that the sky was threatening to snow couldn’t deter any of the early birds who wanted to enter the store right at 8:30 am.

He soon realized that staff were handing out ticket vouchers to customers in their order of arrival. Nagahashi’s number-one hope was to get the fabled and difficult to obtain “Tablet Computer Dreams i” gift box, an annual offering which costs 30,000 yen (US$267). For a short time all he could do was anxiously wait to see if he had made it in time.

His turn finally came and he voiced his desire to the staff member. Success–there were still tickets left! The gift box was officially his. Suddenly waiting in the freezing cold until the store’s opening hour became a lot more bearable.

We won’t dwell on that time, so let’s fast-forward to the moment when he at last received his prize. He eagerly rushed home to break out the contents, and was ecstatic to check out all of the loot.

Here’s what he found (note that the contents may vary slightly from person to person):

• 2017 iPad, A1822 Wi-Fi 32 GB gold (40,824-yen value)
• Elecom iPad Air 2 case, TB-A14WDTBU (around 2,000-yen value)
• Elecom 9.7-inch iPad Pro liquid crystal protective film, TB-A16FLMFG (around 1,300-yen value)
• Elecom liquid crystal wet cleaning tissues (around 100-yen value)

▼Left to right: iPad, tissues, protective film, case

More than anything, Nagahashi was delighted to have received the brand-new iPad. A quick online check revealed that the retail price for the same model is 40,824 yen, so the gift box resulted in huge savings for him–and that’s not even counting the bundled goodies. Speaking of which, at first he was a bit hesitant about the case and protective film since they were advertised for a different model, but there was absolutely no problem with size once he tried them out.

If you’re a big Apple fan and don’t particularly care about specs or colors, but just want a new tablet with iOS, then the Yodobashi “Tablet Computer Dreams i” gift box is a tempting roll of the dice. Nagahashi encourages you to keep it in mind for next year!

Images ©SoraNews24

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