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Since "discovering" Milo in 2020, it seems as if the people of Japan now can't get enough of the stuff.
When a kiosk selling Milo beverages inside of a Tokyo train station opened for business, a tweet containing two photos of the kiosk went viral, with over 161,900 likes and 50,000 retweets at the time of writing.
The tweet, which was posted on March 6, 2021 by Twitter user @TonanLeopard, announced the poster's discovery of a new Milo booth that had opened on the platform of the Machida Station in Tokyo.
小田急线町田駅ホームにミロバーが出来ていた！！飞飞(早速味わった飞) pic.twitter.com/dPbXF0ErmM — 都南レオパルト 絵描垢 ガルパンはイイゾ (@TonanLeopard) March 6, 2021
One of the photos in the post displayed the prices for the beverages on sale, with a standard cup of Milo going for US$1.84 (JPY200) and modified Milo variants with fruit and other ingredients going for US$2.76 (JPY300) – an extremely steep price to pay for a drink that's pretty common in many Southeast Asian countries and even Australia.
Curiously, Milo only recently found popularity in Japan following claims by many Japanese netizens saying that the drink was nutritious and full of health benefits. Since July 2020, the demand for the chocolate-malt beverage has seen a 700 percent spike.
Its popularity has soared to the point that demand for the beverage has outstripped supply, effectively causing parent company Nestlé to recently announce a halt on the sales of certain Milo in the country as it would attempt to increase availability in the coming months.
This caused Milo to even appear on illegal markets with sellers marking up prices hundreds of times higher than usual retail costs.
Unfortunately for Japanese Milo connoisseurs, the Milo kiosk in Machida Station will only be operational until the end of April, and those with insatiable Milo cravings will have to return to scrounging around local markets and convenience stores for powdered versions of the drink, which may continue to prove limited for the time being.
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Cover image sourced from @TonanLeopard on Twitter and More FM.
