Originally posted by TomTom "While
we might enjoy having Pentax tschotske's, Swag as a marketing tool (excepting giant consumer brands such as Budweiser*) is used by company Reps to support relationship building with Dealers. Secondarily it is used to attract attendees to product booths at trade shows."
Nice theory but they sell it to the public in Japan. I've tweeted Ricoh Imaging Americas several times about buying Pentax swag in the US but have never received a response. Tweet them here:
https://twitter.com/PENTAXIAN. There is some cool swag on the
Ricoh jp site but the site is in Japanese so use Chrome or some other tool to translate. I thought that I could create an account on the site and place an order but it appears to require that you must be a resident of Japan to do so.
As a person that has bought items from Japan without being a resident of Japan, I will tell you it can be done. The trick is to use a proxy service like Shopping Mall Japan (
Shopping Mall Japan - Japanese Purchasing, Auction, and Shopping Service! (USA too!)) or somebody living in Japan as a proxy.
Now, the draw back is the cost of the fees. The fees and the cost of shipping can be as much or as more then the cost of the item you are buying, but it will vary depending on where you are buying from. In my case, I was buying from yahoojapan auctions.
Here is how it works
Shopping Mall Japan - Japanese Purchasing, Auction, and Shopping Service! (USA too!)
On the right side are links to the fees, how it works and other information.
If you are here in the USA, they will hold items for you and then you can request all the items shipped to you at the same time to save on shipping in the USA.
If you use a person as a proxy, it will be cheaper but there will still be fees and shipping.
If you really want something that is sold only in Japan, it can be worth it.