It’s Christmas time in Japan, which means it’s time for Christmas cakes! (My wife and I already have our Hello Kitty 50th anniversary cake on order from Baskin-Robbins.) Sadly, the economy is hitting cake makers especially hard this year.
Despite healthy demand, rising wholesale prices mean profits are lower than ever. It’s bad enough that some bakers say they feel like throwing out their piping bags and quitting the Christmas cake business altogether.
Western-style confectionary brand president Takai Tsukasa of Gateau Chef Sanmaido told Niigata News, “[the cost of] everything’s going up. There’s virtually no ingredient that hasn’t gotten pricier.”
One of the most heavily-impacted ingredients is strawberries. They’re among some of the fruits and vegetables that have gotten steadily more expensive in Japan this year.
Unfortunately for cake makers, they’re also the most popular Christmas cake fruit. Shops like Fujita popularized the strawberry and cream Christmas cake decades ago to the point that it’s now a Christmastime staple.
This year, it’s an expensive staple. Takai says strawberries are costing him 800 to 1000 yen ($5.20 to $6.50) a pack. That’s a 20 percent increase over last year. Other confectionary shops across Japan say they’re also feeling the pinch. Some experts say that, as Christmas grows closer and strawberry supplies become more limited, the fruit could even jump to 2000 yen ($13) a pack.
Like Takai said, it’s not just strawberries that are going up in price. French-made chocolate is up to 8000 yen/kg ($52). That’s a spike of between 2000 and 3000 yen ($13-19).
Egg prices have also risen from around 18 yen/kg in January to 280 yen this month. Prices of eggs spiked during last year’s bird flu and have continued to rise ever since.
Bakeries are passing these costs onto the consumer in the form of higher prices. On average, Christmas cake prices are up around 700 yen over a period of three years. One hotel in Kawasaki raised its prices on strawberry cakes by around 1300 yen, from 5700 yen to 7000 yen.
Price hikes have hit other businesses hard as well. Wholesale price spikes and rising energy costs, for example, have hit the ramen industry especially hard.
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