Merch Buyer's Guide: Setting Up a Forwarding Address

Note: This is an updated version of an article that was originally published on Chaos Cute Soft on January 17, 2020.

So you want to buy merch from Japan. But alas, you soon find that many shops don't ship outside Japan. This is where forwarding services come in handy.

What's a Forwarding Service?

A forwarding service is one that, well, forwards your packages to you. In other words, it's a service that gives you an address in Japan to send packages to. When packages arrive there, the service will notify you and from there, you can pay a small fee plus shipping and send the package to your home overseas.

For most anime fans, there are already plenty of options that don't necessitate a forwarding address. Animate, Tokyo Otaku Mode, and CDJapan (note: affiliate link) are just a few shops that are more than willing to ship Japan's goods to your home. But for the hardcore fan looking to get some merch not available through these outlets, there's forwarding services. While there are several such services, Blackship and Tenso are the most popular ones. In this post, I'll be focusing on Blackship, but they all work similarly.

What Will I Need This For Exactly?

Blackship will let you to buy products from virtually any online shop that doesn't ship outside Japan. For me, most notable is the Love Live! School Idol STORE, which is where I buy concert merch such as pen lights, ticket holders, pins, hats, posters, and much more. There are domestic shops that carry these items too, but I prefer to order straight from the source, since it may turn out cheaper that way and I can consolidate my order with packages from other stores.

Amazon.co.jp is English-friendly and will ship most products to America no problem. But even then, some sellers there don't want their products shipped outside Japan. Blackship is the work-around for this.

Blackship will even accept COD (cash-on-delivery) shipments for a small fee, allowing you to order from stores that don't accept non-Japanese credit cards, such as SQUARE-ENIX Japan.

Other Japan-only stores I often order from include A-ON! Store, A!SMART, and HMV&BOOKS.

Ok Great! How Do I Set One Up?

It's easy! Just go to Blackship.com (note: this is a referral link that gives me 300 points and gives you $5 off your first order) and create an account. Once you complete the registration process, which Blackship will guide your through, you'll get a Japanese address that you can use to send shipments to. So once you're ready, start shopping and send your purchases to your new Blackship address!

What Happens When My Package Arrives At Blackship?

Once your package arrives at the Blackship warehouse, you'll get an email to alert you. From that point you can choose to ship it to your home, or, if you're waiting for more packages, you can wait up for them to arrive and then consolidate them into one package. Blackship will store packages at no charge to you for up to 45 days, after which you'll start to accrue fees, so don't wait too long to send your package(s) home!

Shipping will likely not be cheap, so be prepared for a little bit of sticker shock depending on what you're shipping. The fastest shipping options are usually FedEx and DHL, and the shipping cost will vary depending on the package size, items, and other factors. There are cheaper options available if you don't mind waiting, but avoid SAL unless you really need to save money, because that can take up to 3 months or even longer. Consolidating packages also costs a fee, but it's still cheaper than shipping multiple packages separately.

Getting Around the Language Barrier

If you don't know Japanese, shopping on Japanese websites can be frustrating. Many sites do not offer an English option, and many that do, simply do an automated machine translation. A machine translation is better than nothing, but can still be misleading.

Even if you don't fully know Japanese, just knowing katakana will help you around many websites, because many labels on Japanese sites are actually English words written in katakana. This way of writing English words is quite common in Japan.

But chances are you'll still need help from other tools. Google Translate is your best friend in this case. Be sure to grab this Google Chrome plugin, which will let you simply highlight some Japanese text and click a button to translate it without needing to leave the page.

The one thing of utmost importance is to make sure you enter your Blackship address correctly. If you don't, who knows where your package may end up? Fortunately, Blackship has a handy guide on how to enter your address. Even with this, it helps to have the Google Translate plugin so you can easily read any error messages that may come up.

When all else fails, look for a subreddit and/or Discord server related to what you're purchasing. Chances are there will be people there who are willing to help you out. You can even try to contact me and I might be able to help you out.

Can't Someone Do All This For Me?

Actually, yes! There are middleman services that you can go to, tell them what you want, and they will place the order for you from the official shop and take care of the forwarding automatically! DeJapan is one such site that does this. They even support Japanese auction sites! The only downside to this method is, you're limited to which stores you can order from. But if they have what you want, go for it!

That's about all there is to it! Good luck and happy shopping!