Japanese Taste Reviews 

I placed an order of €120 on japanese-taste.nl, assuming it was a Netherlands-based shop because of the .NL domain. What a shocking surprise when my parcel was delivered, and I was asked to pay an extra €40 in taxes and duties — one-third of the total order value!
Nowhere on the website, not during checkout or anywhere obvious, was there any clear warning that such high additional costs would apply. This feels like a total scam.
When I contacted customer service, they completely refused to help. No compensation, no partial refund — just an apology and a link to their shipping page. Absolutely no responsibility taken.

This was the first and last time I will ever order from them. In the end, the products I bought could have been purchased much cheaper in a Dutch store, without all this frustration and hidden costs.
A very misleading experience overall.

It is my second purchase and everythiing went well. They have a good selection of hard-to-find products and the best prices available. I was notified about the status of my order during all the journey. Thank you Japanese Taste!

I'm in the UK. I bought three sharpening stones for £154, which is a reasonable but not low price. I could get little useful tracking info, and a visit to this site raised concerns that JT may not deliver. It was a relief when I finally received the goods from FedEx.
However, a week later, I was unpleasantly surprised when FedEx emailed me demanding £40 in customs fees. Will I buy from Japanese Taste again, or recommend them? No chance.

I bought some kitchen equipment, The price for the mandolin was the cheapest i could find online beating other stores by $20-$40. I was pleased with the welcome 20% discount. The delivery time was quoted at 9-15 days and the parcel arrived at or within 9 days. i had a good experience with this online store so i recommend

Really poor service. Parcel was left on my doorstep in full public view. Unsurprisingly, it was no longer there by the time I got home.

Company refused to take any responsibility, or to explain why no effort was made either to leave the package with my neighbour, who works from home, or at the very least behind a wheelie bin or something.

60 quid just thrown away.

Avoid.

Very scammy, I paid $150 for multiple items and expedited shipping and never received my items. When I called them out on it they said the items were delivered. I checked the tracking for the items and it showed "in transit" with an estimated delivery of a week ago. DO NOT ORDER FROM, very untrustworthy, probably a scam, zero customer service help.

DO NOT ORDER FROM THIS COMPANY. I cannot stress that enough. The customer service is abysmal. Additionally, I never received my item. Disputed transaction with my card company, as the response was less than mediocre.

Great selection of goods. Unfortunately, my order got snagged at customs due to paperwork error on Japanese Taste's end, and accrued a brokerage fee which was around 300USD (equivalent), and more than the order itself. Though this was flagged this with customer service, they quoted their terms and conditions and did nothing else. Unfortunately, I will not be recommending them to family and friends, an dhave started using Rakuten instead as the price is comparable.

The worst website ever with the worst customer service. I ordered for the first time with them summer powder and I chose the shade of it based on their description in the site and I found out when I received the product, it is a very dark shade that should be used for tanning not as a foundation at all.

Placed an order 3 weeks ago and it still has not shipped. My attempts to contact customer service have been met with little clarity. I have submitted 2 emails requesting the order be cancelled and my money refunded and have not heard back from anyone in over a week.
I'm posting this to let consumers know they should be careful shopping with this company!

Ordered some products and got them after 2 weeks. Delivered from Japan to Sweden. Everything went smoothly :) glad that I gave the website a chance!

I lost my package but no support

I was a bit afraid after reading all the reviews here, but my pretty big order arrived 2 weeks after placing the order (2 days from Japan to the UK once it's been shipped, that's mad!!). Everything in my order arrived and the sweets have 5 months left on their best by date. I'm super happy with this company and will be ordering from them in the future. It seems the taxes apply to orders over £139 according to the gov website, mine was £125, it qualified for free shipping but I didn't pay any extra taxes.

Update: I politely contacted the company multiple times about my frustrations and was met with a stonewall of rejection - don't waste your time.

New customer here! I recently ordered Tokyo Banana from Japanese Taste intending to give it as a gift, but when the package arrived, the expiration date was only four days away. Nowhere on the product page did it clearly state that the shelf life would be so short, especially for a gift item.

After contacting customer support, I was met with a polite but dismissive response. While they acknowledged the short shelf life and claimed they'd consider improving their website, they still refused to issue a refund—even though the product was essentially unusable for its intended purpose.

It’s incredibly disappointing to spend hard-earned money on something that can’t be used, only to be told that it's technically “within policy.” This feels like a loophole used to avoid doing right by the customer.

I won’t be ordering again, and I suggest others avoid time-sensitive items from this store unless you’re planning to eat them all yourself immediately upon arrival. That was not the case for me with 3 boxes of Tokyo Banana.

A little transparency & doing right by customers would go a long way. As it stands, I have no intent to shop here a second time nor will I recommend them.

I placed an order on the 16th of April 2025 and received my package on the 23rd of April. I am in the US and I did not incur any extra charges from Fedex, customs, etc. It took around 4 days for them to ship from the time I placed the order but it arrived only 3 days after being shipped. I will definitely buy from them again.

Scammed. Forced to pay taxes, hidden fees. No chance to return.

I live in US, and there was no extra custom fee that was charged. I made a big order, like $200 including snack box. So it took time to be filled, I would say about 10 days or more before it shipped. So, I think it took 3weeks to be delivered after I ordered. It was longer that I expected, but the package was done beautifully, and food and snacks were wonderful. I just made my 3rd order and just expecting the same experience.

The site has a .nl extension giving you the impression that they import and supply the products locally. They don’t really give you any warning other than the fine print in the shipping info section at the bottom of the site that the goods are imported and so you need to pay custom duties. The customs cost half the price of my entire order which has left a sour taste in my mouth to ever order from here again. It’s a pity because it’s a great site with an awesome product range. But the transparency should be better.

If I could rate them with 0 stars, I would. Absolute nightmare. I ordered a few items from them (the total amount was 168 EUR) on Feb 3. Paid for the express shipping (tracked, Insured, 3-6 Business Days). Contacted them 3 weeks later because the parcel never arrived. It was stuck in customs due to the incorrect declaration from their side. Paid import taxes. Finally, end of February, the parcel arrived with half of the items missing!
I contacted the support, they promised to compensate both the missing items cost and the express shipping cost. They never compensated the express shipping costs. Fast forward 2 months, I received an invoice from UPS regarding extra charges from the customs (252 EUR!) because of the wrong custom declaration from their side (instant noodles suddenly became fish and meat items). I contacted Japanese Taste's customer support by email and chat but was ignored. Had to pay the UPS. DON'T BUY ANYTHING FROM THEM! This store is scamming people.

One of the worst on-line experiences I've had. Placed my first on-line order totaling just under $100. Immediately after placing order, I reached out to customer support requesting they apply 15% discount code GET15V8PTG64T toward order. No response for two days. Reached out to them for a second time requesting they cancel my order as order status shows my order has not been processed. Definitely a communication barrier. Will never order from Japanese Taste again. They do not honor their coupon codes and response time is horrible.