27 November, 2012

Answer to Hard-Off and Off-House photo quiz

Time to reveal what these stores sell. They are second hand stores, hence "off".

Hard-Off sells second-hand electronics, hardware, cameras, other appliances, musical instruments etc.
http://www.hardoff.co.jp/shop_hard.htm

Off-House sells second-hand household goods, clothing etc.
http://www.hardoff.co.jp/shop_off.htm

As one commenter noted, there is also "BookOff", second-hand bookstores. I Googled it and to my surprise found that there are stores in the US as well as France and Korea. 

The names of the stores are a tad mysterious, though, for native English speakers.

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6 comments:

  1. Deb27 November, 2012 10:21

    Ahhh! It was the dots that got me sucked in. I thought they must be bubbles and then went with cleaning. How does "off" relate to secondhand?

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  2. Karen27 November, 2012 18:52

    Well, there you go. Would never have picked that.

    So is it like Cash Converters here?

    I too am not sure how "off" relates to second hand??

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  3. Wendy27 November, 2012 19:09

    No, not like cash converters, in that you can't buy your stuff back.

    "Off" as in it is cheaper than if you buy it new? Does that make sense, or have I been living in Japan too long?

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  4. Caroline28 November, 2012 06:52

    Or are they "off" because they're selling things that people have cast off?

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  5. April28 November, 2012 17:30

    It's "off" as in "x% off the original price" because it's used.

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  6. Wendy01 December, 2012 18:04

    I did some FB research and a Japanese speaker said, "I can assure you that 'cast off' is not part of the common understanding of English."

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