As someone who grew up eating Calbee snacks, I think they’ll be fine.
People from my generation aren’t buying Calbee because the bag is colorful. They’re buying it because it’s Calbee and they already know what they’re getting. The packaging could be black and white and I’d still recognize it instantly.
The only people I could see being briefly confused are younger consumers. Japanese packaging tends to be very colorful, so we’re all conditioned to identify products partly by color. But people adapt quickly. In fact, a black-and-white Calbee bag might end up standing out more on a crowded supermarket shelf than yet another brightly colored package.
There’s also a chance this ends up being a net positive. If simpler packaging lowers costs and sales stay the same, why go back? Japanese consumers are feeling inflation more than they have in decades, and companies are under pressure too. Cutting costs in a place customers barely notice seems a lot smarter than shrinking the product or raising prices again.
> If simpler packaging lowers costs and sales stay the same
In reality packaging is a very big part of marketing. People are drawn by vivid and bright colors, which is especially relevant in the modern world where unfortunately so many of us are living in a permanent hyper-stimulated state. It's hard to ignore well-designed packaging with tastefully chosen colors even if you're someone who is mindful about their eating/consumption choices and you know that what's inside that packaging is totally different from what you see from the outside.
Absolutely. If packaging and marketing stopped mattering so much once the public already knows a product well, Coca-cola could have stopped spending so much on their brand a long time ago.
If packaging and marketing stopped mattering so much Coca-cola would go out of business immediately. Sugar water is cheap and simple to make. The off-brands taste just as good if not better in blind testing. The only defense they have is their brand and the amount of money they spend on marketing. Same with Red Bull.
I think the dialysis supply shortage may be less of a charming quirk than the potato chip bags.
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I wouldn't say the present strategy worked a lot better so maybe the whole world had a point.
I never made that argument.
I just tend to thing bullies should be crushed rather than appeased.
That's how the whole world is feeling about America now, yes. Nobody outside of America and Israel were ever remotely bothered by Iran. Especially not Japan, which had a good relationship with Iran going back a century. It's really just absurd how America decided to attack a partner of Japan and damage our economy so much for zero benefit whatsoever.
> Nobody outside of America and Israel were ever remotely bothered by Iran
That is not true. Saudi Arabia has been fighting a proxy war with them for years. The EU and Uk have had sanctions on them for years. Lots of people care about their treatment of religious minorities, gays and women.
Europe had sanctions to avoid the American sanctions on places that didn't have sanctions, they'd rather trade with America than with Iran, but they don't actually care themselves.
When did the US threaten sanctions on western Europe?
Much of Europe has a problem with Russia and Iran is an ally of Russia. They supply each other with weapons.
> Lots of people care about their treatment of religious minorities, gays and women.
I'm really not sure which country you're talking about here. Saudi Arabia? Because Saudi Arabia is even worse than Iran in this respect but they're not being bombed. Should they be bombed?
I am aware of that. Its a list and those people are a different item to Saudi Arabia. I mean people in lots of countries as a counter example to 'nobody'
>zero benefit whatsoever.
There were benefits achieved. I'm assuming you're a traditional Japaneese person that's not familiar with USA drama-level politics. But these drama-level politics are now affecting the fate of the whole world*.
There is/was a children lovers ring which was gradually being revealed to have ties to many important people. People ready to start wars and cause suffering of millions just to steer the public opinion away from revelations on this child-lovers ring. You can learn more about this ring by googling it's apparent leader, whos name rhymes with Frankenstein. It looks like a man, who used to be named Milejkowski and has Polish roots, also had a great influence on this war even happening. His apparent leverage on Trump is not neccesarily disconnected from Frankenstein.
And this attempt to steer the public opinion away from the subject until mid-term elections are done has largery succeeded. At least until the whole operation stopped being Venezuela '26 and is slowly nearing something like American Invasion of Vietnam.
Additionally, while US people loose money due to Trump's War, many US companies are making a good buck on it (oil, military, more?). And these companies have money to influence US goverment decisions.
Sorry to say it, as this makes the world look much more cynical and evil. At least compared to a world where Trump's War was started to zero benefit whatsoever. There are people benefitting on your loss. And even though your loss is arguably greater than their benefit, they don't care.
* There's a good chance that thousands, worst case even millions, will starve. There are already crops NOT being planted due to fertilizer and fuel prices hike. Lack of this food will be felt in a few months to a year from now.
So, dialysis patients had their supplies on a regular basis, and then the Ayatollah Khamenei was assassinated (hard to get more crushed) during peace negotiations, and now dialysis patients are at risk.
Seems like being a bully achieved very little .. why tear up the original hard won agreement that allowed inspection and kept the uranium enrichment in check in the first place?
What do you mean why? His White House posted Obamas as monkeys, he hates everything Barrack achieved as a president and who he is.
Trump is a scam artist as all his prior achievements show, so of course he will damage anything he can't turn into his personal profit. I bet his "negotiations" involve kickbacks for his family personally, in a similar way he "appropriated" profit from the seized Venezuelan tankers.
Don't treat the guy like he was a philosopher. He's a felon, prominently mentioned in the infamous Trump-Epstein files.
So, how are you planning on dealing with Trump and friends? Appeasement clearly isn't working.
???
Your reasoning is, excuse my french, completely biased and stupid as fuck.
Every world leader holds millions of lives in their hands, whether by economic or military decisions. You don't just get to kill the ones you don't like.
It's the warmongering pieces of trash, who think that wasting unfathomable amounts of human life and labor blowing up their rivals for personal or geopolitical benefit is justified, who need to be placed under permanent arrest so the rest of us can get on with building useful things, living fulfilling lives, and loving each other as the vast majority of credulous, earnest people do.
Iran has been repeatedly attacked by Western imperialism over the last ~100 years (look it up), which directly created the extreme regimes currently in place, who have been ACTIVELY NEGOTIATING even while the US unilaterally initiates EVERY escalation in this conflict.
I don't think that any violent power structure is good, but you won't deceive anyone with a brain and a conscience thinking that the US is the good guys or that Iran deserved this, by pointing at the shortages that are a direct result of US imperial aggression
Trump is in the Epstein files thousands of times. Trump is current waging lawfare again a woman who proved in court he is a rapist. Trump is threatening every aspect of american civil life and global rules-based geopolitics because he is a bully.
Go on, get crushing.
So, what's your proposal for dealing with Trump then? The world waits with bated breath...
May I suggest a very public trial and then seizure of all assets from this family, and then high security South-American prison?
Who would conduct that trial?
Iran could do it
A thrombus is a blood clot in a distal blood vessel. When it becomes dislodged it becomes known as an embolism which, if it settles in a pulmonary or coronary artery, can rapidly become fatal. The chances of this happening are greatly increased in the elderly and those with known circulatory problems.
C'mon litle guy. You can make yourself famous. Be brave and let go of the wall of that leg vein. Say good bye to that comfy cankle and enter into your full glory.
> I just tend to thing bullies should be crushed rather than appeased
Cool it with the antisemitism. Netanyahu's actions were short-sighted but understandable, labeling him a "bully" is not fair.
Hard to say at this point. Imagine in 50 years historians would write like "but crazy regimes kept developing nuclear weapons to exterminat nations they don't like, and the whole world just kept watching doing nothing until it was too late".
The world was not "just watching doing nothing", there was a Iran nuclear deal that made sure they didn't get nuclear weapons.
I know right? countries with nuclear arsenal constantly attacking like rabid dogs and has no respect to human life, what a nasty combination.
It is.
Guatemala, Grenada, Panama, Afghanistan, Afghanistan (that's deliberate), Kuwait, Ukraine, Georgia, Vietnam, Vietnam, Vietnam (also deliberate)... all of these countries and more have been invaded by nuclear powers.
Yeah, it's not very comfortable having a tiny-penis-syndrome's and alcoholic wife beater's fingers on the nuclear launch button...
We already watched while the crazy Zionist regime developed nuclear weapons.
And the genius move was to upset him without an exit strategy?
If your mom's life was in the hands of some thug, going in trying to beat him up, and then failing to win, pissing him off, is not a clever move...
"If you know the enemy and know yourself, you need not fear the result of a hundred battles. If you know yourself but not the enemy, for every victory gained you will also suffer a defeat. If you know neither the enemy nor yourself, you will succumb in every battle." - Sun Tzu, Art of War
Maybe Trump's follow-up to the Art of the Deal should be "The New Art of War". (Although I just realize now that the title of that book most likely because "Art of War" was a very popular book for business strategy in the 80's.
Trump and Bibi did this, Iran's response is perfectly legitimate and proportionate.
You realize the Strait of Hormuz is shared territorial waters between Oman and Iran right? It’s not an international waterway like the orange shit stain likes to say.
It is an international water way according to current rules. Iran is trying to change that.
No according to current UN maritime law it’s not international waters: territorial waters extend up to 12 nautical miles from the coast line. Iran could have always done this, but Trumps use of perfidy (luring Iran into negotiations to murder the negotiators) and assassination of the heads of state and military leadership of Iran have permanently erased that good will and shared use of the Strait.
Stupid hogs are ruining this country because they lack critical thinking skills and normal expectations for how countries should behave.
The Strait had long had a different status from most other waters.
Of course there is always an advocate for every little incremental step of the deliberate chaos that the world's helmsmen have been steering into.
OBEY.
I think you are overly optimistic and forget a few key facts here.
According to wiki, 8% of males and 0.5% of female suffer from colorblindness. That means for the rest of the people, the color is part of the information that our brain use subconsciously when we go and grab a bag of Calbee.
Will it affect the Japanese general public? Minor inconvenience for sure. Will it affect sales? Probably for area popular by tourist? Maybe it move the needle by 1%?
But what's important that's below the fold is there could be other knock on effect as naphtha is used to make other product.
FYI, those 8% of males / 0.5% females stats are not about complete colorblindness, so almost all of those people use color in their life
Yes for men mostly it’s red/green colorblindness. It’s one reason traffic lights have a uniform order and why you might get tested on which light means stop and not what color on a written test in the US.
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Did you actually read the article past the hero image?
> Teikoku Databank has identified 52 Japanese companies using naphtha to make basic chemical products like ethylene, synthetic rubber, and PVC resin.
> The chemicals, petroleum, and coal products manufacturing sector is most vulnerable to naphtha price rises and shortages; of the 4,700 companies in this sector, 67.2% are integrated into the naphtha supply chain.
From the official guidelines https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html
> Please don't comment on whether someone read an article. "Did you even read the article? It mentions that" can be shortened to "The article mentions that".
May be good to edit your comment to remove the first sentence.
I won't.
Appropriate username is appropriate.
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