Cheap souvenirs?

I'll be in Japan in July for over a month. I'm a teacher and from every holiday I always take a small present for my students (adults) with me. But as I have a little over 80 students, I hope you can understand they need to be cheap, because 1 present of let's say 300 yen isn't bad, but more than 80 will be an awful lot of money. :(

Sometimes I bought packages of presents, and then I took the separate items apart. To give you an idea of what I already gave my students: little worry-dolls from Guatemala, semi-precious stones like green quartz from Namibia, incense from India, small fans from Indonesia, licorice from Finland, beef jerky from South Africa, chopsticks from Hong Kong, little animals made of soapstone from Zimbabwe, and more.

Does anyone here have an idea of what I could bring home to give to my students? It will go into my checked luggage in the airplane, so weight is also important.

Thanks for your ideas in advance, I'm sure my students will love it.

What about something like origami paper? You can get a set at somewhere cheap like daisy, give each student a sheet, and then make a paper crane together with them?

I'm guessing food is probably not something you like to bring back from your list, but my cousins loved the weird umaibo flavor a I got them. You get 10 for 108 yen at daiso. In fact you might want to check out daiso anyway, there's some great stuff there and you might find something that works!

It is a popular souvenir ranking last year of daiso.
Harajuku shop
http://english.cheerup.jp/article/1501?page=2
Aeon Mall Kyoto shop
http://english.cheerup.jp/article/1501?page=3
Kansai Airport shop
http://english.cheerup.jp/article/1501?page=4

100Yen shop! (100‹Ï/hyakkin 108Y/tax)
https://www.youtube.com/results?q=100%E5%9D%87&sp=CAI%253D
https://www.youtube.com/results?q=%E3%83%80%E3%82%A4%E3%82%BD%E3%83%BC...

https://youtu.be/08sQJUcUfc0
�îŽq/sensu(folding fan) is one of good!
http://japanese-culture.info/keywords/daily_life/others-daily_life/sen...
"Good sens(u)" and "Good sens(e)" are same sound.
This is Japanese fan... oops "pun" :)

FYI Japanese pan(bread) are very "fun". (not only rice based cuture)

Thank you all!

@hao1210: there are no prices at the lists you gave (or I didn't look well enough). Can you tell me more please?

Daiso is a 100 yen shop. With tax is 108 yen per item.

How about japanese stamps.

You can buy the older ones at the stamp collection shop.
Recently stamp collection is not popular as collection boom was fade away, though it was popular in my childhood Fifty years ago.

Off course you can buy new ones on standard price.
Recently we can see local stamp which you can use but has local view in it, and is sold in local post office.

https://www.the-seiyu.com/front/commodity/00000000/4902201168212/

http://stat.ameba.jp/user_images/20120102/17/kayo-syoku2004/92/7c/j/o0800060011711215215.jpg

Mini Kitkat Macha flavor is something special and well known chocolate only available in Japan.

One large pack contains 12 small macha kitkat(2 pieces small kitkat each), so you will need 7 packs which will cost you about 2,000 Yen.
You can buy at major large supermarkets or discount stores in JP.

You might also want to check out one of the many Don Quijote stores in Japan http://www.donki.com/en/ They usually have cheap souvenirs and stuff, even if they don't have the right souvenir it's a fun store to browse. And as others already mentioned the \100 stores are also fun and you never know what you will find.
Happy travels, ann

Sorry, that should read 100 yen stores, somehow the yen sign didn't come through....
ann

Hello, fellow teacher! I'm not going 'til April 2017, but my suggestions for class souvenirs are low-denomination coins (1-yen coins are aluminum, so fairly lightweight) and foil-packet green teabags.

If you're in the United States, Daiso does bulk mail order, and they have physical stores in California and Texas. Even Daiso may be out of your budget for 80 people, though!

I also like the idea of origami paper.

Don't forget to also buy some nice things for yourself!

@ All: Thanks for your input & links

@ Nancy: my students are (mostly male) adults between 30 and 60 years old. I don't think I'll please them with a 1 yen coin or a tea bag. I have been searching online and I found some shops in Kanazawa (which I may or may not visit, not sure yet), which sell candy with some slivers of gold in it, per bag of 15 pieces for a reasonable price. I think that might be a really special thing to try, I mean, how many of us eat gold? ;)

PS. I'm not in the States, but in the Netherlands.

FYI, chocolate is liable to melt in the heat.

Yeah, males would be MUCH harder to shop for! I wonder if you could find small packs of senbei (rice crackers) in assorted flavors?

Tenugui (hand towels) make great souvenirs and should be available at the 100 yen stores. It would be worth it to figure up the weight before you leave to estimate whether they'd be worth mailing home. Men would favor motifs like traditional (masculine) patterns, sumo, and samurai. Worth getting even if you only have a few on hand as a student prize for some activity or another.

Once you're in Japan, assuming you'll stay put for awhile, look into the feasability of mailing souvenirs home with International e-packet." You should be able to send up to 2kg for around $25 USD, but of course there are two catches:

1. Supplies must be sent to you in advance (in Japan).
2. Minimum and maximum size restrictions.
3. Mailing label(s) cannot be hand-written.

Sorry, I can't think in metric! It will be much easier for you. :)