Editor's Note: There is another forwarding service called "Tenso Japan." We are not reviewing that one. This review is for the original "Tenso." Don't get the two confused.
What Tenso is doing is one of those ideas where you think “dang, I shoulda thought of that.” It’s simple, it’s helpful, and provides a really good service. I tried it out recently, and they let me pick out a Japanese t-shirt and ship it via their service, so that I can give it away to one of you. More information on that at the end of the post.
So here’s the rundown on Tenso:
- You go to a Japanese website that sells something.
- You order the item, and have it shipped to your tenso.com address (the address is free). The package is then sent to them, located in Tokyo.
- They get the package, and then send it to you at a discounted rate.
Now why is this service convenient? Why is it better? First of all, a lot of places won’t ship internationally. If they do, it’s stupidly expensive to do so. Tenso is a shipping company, and all their specialty is shipping outside the country, which means you get a discount. Shipping from a store in Japan to Tenso is very cheap. I know I wish I had known about this service when I was shipping Christmas gifts from Japan. Would have saved a lot of money :(
My favorite sites to shop with Tenso are Amazon.co.jp and Yahoo Auctions. With these two sites alone, you can pretty much find anything you want. There’s a ton of other specialty shops, though, as well as a shopping with PayPal if that’s how you roll.
Go check it out – there’s a lot of good stuff out there waiting to be bought. There may be hope for all of you who wish you had a ridiculously warm panda hat like mine.