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The story
According to a survey by Teikoku Databank, a credit research firm, bankruptcies of Japanese confectionery (wagashi) shops in Japan from January to September 2026 reached 22 cases (legal insolvency proceedings involving liabilities of 10 million yen or more), putting 2026 on pace to surpass 2025 — previously the worst year on record. The report points to a combination of factors: profit pressure from rising raw material costs, growing difficulty passing down craftsmanship as artisans age, the burden of capital investment in shops and factories, and the weight of repaying loans taken out during the COVID-19 pandemic. On 5ch, opinions clashed between posters arguing “there’s no demand for wagashi anymore, and the flavors haven’t evolved,” and others pointing out that “some shops stay in business through wholesale to department stores and supermarkets even when there’s no one in the store,” sparking a debate over the real state of the industry.
Released 7:03 AM, Saturday, Oct 3
Teikoku Databank
From January to September 2026, 22 “wagashi (Japanese confectionery) shop” bankruptcies occurred (legal insolvency proceedings involving liabilities of 10 million yen or more). This already surpasses 2025, the previous record year, putting the pace on track to set a new all-time high. Rising raw material costs are squeezing profits, while the aging of artisans is making it harder to pass down traditional techniques. On top of that, the burden of capital investment for new shops and factories, plus the weight of repaying loans taken out during the COVID-19 pandemic, are compounding to make the business environment increasingly harsh.
Source: news.yahoo.co.jp / original article here
What people said
Period dramas
Enka (traditional Japanese ballads)
Wagashi
Weird, huh?
None of that stuff is especially popular with anyone younger than the baby boomer generation anyway
You really think people automatically start loving enka and wanting to watch period dramas once they get old?
Me, you, anybody — nah, that's not how it works
It's not that strange, really
Today's old folks are just what became of the hip young people of the 1980s
And icons of 80s youth culture like Ryuichi Sakamoto and Akira Toriyama have already passed away
Anko (sweet red bean paste) wagashi and its juice are actually perfect for a low-fat diet when you're lifting weights
Clueless amateurs should stay quiet
Somewhere, an Indian guy says: "Huh?" (a jab referencing hand-eaten/hand-made food traditions elsewhere)
These days they use rubber gloves
The whole ceremonial-occasions market is dead and gone
But wagashi shops with one strong signature item are doing fine as ever
They sell through the internet and wholesale to department stores and supermarkets nationwide
Western confections have gotten so expensive that customers won't even walk into the store anymore
He was wetting his hands and kneading the anko by hand, and I thought, yeah, no way
Same with sushi hand-pressed by an artisan, can't do it lol
Your "I've been conditioned to find this gross" act is getting old
Chateraise never has enough staff on hand, I always give up and leave
Every time I go, there's no customers. But they haven't gone under in decades.
It's baffled me, genuinely baffled me.
Turns out it's not really about selling in the shop — most of their business is wholesale to department stores like the ones in Aobadai and Tama Plaza.
Never been to Kameya Mannendo, but I've had their Navona (famous cream sandwich) plenty of times
Navona isn't really wagashi though, is it
Looks more like a bussé cake to me
Minamoto Kitchoan makes upscale sweets suited for tea ceremony use
They probably have a steady customer base from the tea ceremony crowd🙄
They just have local wagashi shops around the country make it, then buy it in and sell it
Seriously?
So does that mean the flavor varies by region?
Skewered dango for over 120 yen a stick
Yamazaki's mitarashi dango, anko dango, and sesame dango are great value
Though their artificially-colored "three dango brothers" set is a bad deal
Yamazaki's stuff is pretty tasty too, honestly
It's basically all trehalose
Dango that doesn't even use mochi rice
Sweetened with artificial sweeteners
It's over
That whole "our shop keeps the traditional recipe, generation after generation" attitude means zero evolution
It's just anko and mochi boiled down with sugar into some dumb one-note flavor
Western confections have real depth — not just sweetness but the richness of fat, plus a far wider range of ingredients
Western confectioners compete on technique like it's a death match, so even third-rate shops taste good
Wagashi shops can all go under, honestly
That's just you admitting you can only tell obvious, in-your-face flavors apart
This is a raw-material-cost problem, not a taste problem ʅ（◞‿◟）ʃ
Sounds like you can't even tell the difference between wasanbon (fine traditional Japanese sugar) and aspartame
Not being able to raise prices and still get customers ≈ it's not tasty
These days cake runs 800 yen a piece
Wagashi is still crawling along at 200 yen a piece because it doesn't taste good enough to charge 800 yen for the same weight
Western-style confectioners are shutting down too, you know ʅ（◞‿◟）ʃ
Lol, a guy who judges sweets by price-per-gram
Background and key points of debate
Teikoku Databank’s tally is limited to legal insolvency proceedings involving liabilities of 10 million yen or more, so it’s worth noting this doesn’t capture smaller closures or shops that simply stopped operating quietly. The four factors the report cites — rising raw material costs, aging artisans, the burden of capital investment, and repayment of pandemic-era loans — point to a structural problem that can’t be explained away by a simple “falling out of love with wagashi” narrative. The thread’s disagreement centered on whether to blame the rise in bankruptcies on wagashi’s flavor and weak demand, or to treat it as a distribution-structure issue. Those on the latter side pointed to examples like Minamoto Kitchoan, where shops stay in business through wholesale to department stores and supermarkets even with few customers showing up in person, casting doubt on the simple equation “no customers = going under.” At the same time, some posters noted that Western-style confectioners are shutting down at a similar clip, so whether this is a problem unique to the wagashi industry or a trend across the confectionery business as a whole can’t be settled by the thread discussion alone.
*This article is excerpted and summarized from the 5ch (News Speed+) thread “Wagashi shop bankruptcies keep coming, 2026 on pace for an all-time high as rising raw material costs pile on.”
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