In the late 1990s coming in to the early 2000s, The Asterisk Club was the community for Snow Peakers in Japan. With a small online portal that was as rudimentary as most of the early internet, it quickly needed something new. For 2005, that something new would come in the form of Snow Peak Club.
While predominantly an online forum, Snow Peak Club offered a way of connecting before the social media groups of today. Users could post and see reviews on campgrounds, gear, share photos, plan meetings and share their personal websites and blogs.
Amazingly, the Snow Peak Club website is still active on the Snow Peak Japan servers in addition to being archived by the Internet Archive.
Online from 2005-2015, there were a number of limited edition items that were made available to the nearly 70,000 members. We're fortunate to have some of these items are in our own archive - but let's unpack the specifics.
Snow Peak Club Stainless Steel Mug
In 2007, to celebrate the two-year anniversary of Snow Peak Club and hitting the 10,000 member milestone, Snow Peak celebrated with a large giveaway. The premise was simple, enter the lottery and win "anything you want". Yes, any of the new items released for 2007 was yours to pick from. This was actually not the first time they'd done this. One year earlier for the one-year anniversary a much smaller giveaway was held where 1 lucky winner would receive the same carte blanche award.
In addition to this, for 2007 there would be 700 recipients of the Snow Peak Club Stainless Steel Mug. Nearly identical to the standard Stainless Steel Mug offered for over a decade, this variant featured a monochromatic Snow Peak Club logo. While all of the images shown here are of the navy variant, maroon and yellow options were also available. Quick note, in 2006 50 mugs were given away bringing the total we can account for to just 750.
750 may seem like a lot, but in the world of camping equipment it makes these items incredibly hard to find. Typically, if they do appear on the 2nd hand market they are well loved, and the screen printed graphic is generally well worn. It makes us even more grateful that we have a new old stock one in our archive.
Unfortunately, 2007 would be the last year that these giveaways were held. Curious what the three "Anything you want" winners picked?
| SPC handle name | Your desired product |
| komkom | Living Mesh Shelter |
| Tomi | NOASOBI PRO Pants |
| Okay | Giga Power LI Stove Goen |
The Snow Peak Zippo
Snow Peak released their a Zippo lighter withogo debossed into the stainless steel case in the late 1990s. Offered in two colors, it was part of a large trend starting in the 80s for custom, bespoke and sometimes outlandish Zippo lighters offered by predominantly outdoor companies in Japan.
For 2005 though, while standard versions were offered on the Snow Peak website for ￥6,825 (about $44), for 150 members of Snow Peak Club a laser engraving service was offered. Up to 12 characters in one of 3 fonts were available to choose from
It's unclear if all 150 were sold, but it is clear that there weren't many which made it to market. Browsing 2nd hand listings you'll find they command a staggeringly high price, with new old stock pieces selling for ￥100,000 (about $640).
Snow Peak Club Wakubi Chopsticks:
If 750 mugs are hard to find, the Snow Peak Club Ebony Model Wakubi Chopsticks may as well not exist. Unlike the mugs, which were identical save for color variants, the chopsticks were each one of a kind. Snow Peak released 500 pairs for the months of June and July in 2005, each individually numbered to celebrate the two-year anniversary of the Snow Peak Club reopening.
Like the Zippos, members of Snow Peak Club could opt for a couple dollars more to have up to 12 characters laser-engraved on the opposite side of the handle. This option, generally a name or SPC username, was not often taken up.
Additionally, ebony wood tips were included in each set instead of the (at the time) typical oak. This marked the second time ebony would be used, only one of four times it has been used in the 30 years the Wakubi chopsticks were created. Perhaps even more unique, it's the only time ebony was chosen for a non-festival release.
| Material |
Tip: Ebony |
The two part numbers, SCT-003LE and SCT-003LE-N for Limited Edition and Name, were only a couple hundred yen more than the standard model. These were really meant to not be a rare item, but a special bonus for Snow Peak Club Members. We're fortunate enough to have 6 pairs in the archive - though in researching and building this archive we've been able to attribute 33 pairs in total to various owners that are listed in the table below.
| #/500 |
SPC Username | Engraved Name | Notes |
| Unknown | Camp Papa | ||
| Unknown | CHOCO Papper | Unreadable name | |
| 022 | Yopi Papa | ||
| 039 | Unknown | Ryu | In Kōrogi Archive |
| 077 | HawaiiKona | HawaiiKona | In Kōrogi Archive |
| 087 | O-kiku | ||
| 134 | t*arima | ||
| 144 | Unknown | Sae | In Kōrogi Archive |
| 154 | t*arima | ||
| 155 | SHIGEBO | ||
| 159 | doi | ||
| 171 | yellow flag | ||
| 176 | O-kiku | ||
| 180 | Unknown | Dora | In Kōrogi Archive |
| 183 | tetsu | ||
| 201 | SHIGEBO | ||
| 209 | HawaiiKona | HawaiiKona | In Kōrogi Archive |
| 230 | t*arima | ||
| 254 | doi | ||
| 300 | hisa@kinari's dad | ||
| 303 | SHIGEBO | ||
| 304 | Unknown | Sold August 2022 | |
| 306 | SHIGEBO | ||
| 321 | ushioni | ||
| 323 | Unknown | In Kōrogi Archive | |
| 348 | HawaiiKona | HawaiiKona | In Kōrogi Archive |
| 357 | moto | ||
| 370 | O-kiku | ||
| 375 | Unknown | Kaho | In Kōrogi Archive |
| 387 | t*arima | ||
| 402 | Sue-chan | ||
| 445 | ushioni | ||
| 471 | MyDo Tuck |