Coffee Shops in Japan -Trends and Franchises

Sipping coffee has been a Japanese favorite pastime for a half century. There are, in my view, a few different types of coffee places you'll run across in Japan.

Kissaten / 喫茶店 (Tea-Sipping Shop)

"Kissaten" is a classic old style coffee shop. It used to be that this type of establishment was about the only place to have a cup of coffee in Japan. At this shop they mainly serve coffee and soft drinks, and some classic lunch-like dishes such as Spaghetti Neapolitan, omuraisu (omelet over flavored rice), sandwiches and maybe a simple ice cream sundae.

Actually, the term "kissaten" is rather old and unfashionable now, though these coffee shops are still around. What you will likely see in a place like this is a guy sitting by himself reading the sports pages or a manga magazine, a couple of mid-aged neighbors, or a taxi driver taking a break. It is a low key, down to earth, nothing special atmosphere.

Being old and unfashionable, recently this type is revived similar to visiting the Showa (the era before current "Heisei") ruins. The photo is outside of Oka in Ueno, Tokyo. We used to go to these places as juveniles, acting like 20+ when we were 15 or so!! It was our place to hang out those days. To me these kissaten impose an image of those "acting 20+" are still there although they are way older than 20+ now, meaning you don't expect a contemporary "atmosphere" but it may still be interesting. Their coffee and foods may be good and the price range of a cup of coffee may be around 400~500 yen.

Cafe / カフェ

A "cafe" in Japan is just like a cafe in France, Italy or the States. Lately, "Cafe" likely means a fashionable coffee place people intentionally visit. This photo is of the Canal Cafe in Tokyo. There is a quite similar cafe here in Chicago by the river. They serve coffee and other soft drinks, sweets and lunch, brunch and dinner. It all depends on the individual business but many serve Western dishes.

A recent trend is for cafes to be established at a countryside location or in a remodeled traditional house. At a Countryside Cafe 田舎カフェ, which you will find (obviously) in a rural area, drinks and foods made with local products are served. Using a remodeled traditional house for a cafe (or other business) is common in the preserved historical areas but also in big cities.

Here is a photo of the Koguma Cafe こぐまカフェ near the brand new Sky Tree Tower. It is in a small area near the Sky Tree where was not burned out by the Tokyo Air Raid on 3/20/1945. I haven't been in the area for a long time so I don't know what it looks like now, but it seems they still have buildings standing from the pre-WWII. Most areas in central Tokyo were all burned down, common people's houses older than 1945 were not very common even 50 years ago. Anyway, this neighborhood near Sky Tree survived; some houses pre-1945 are still there today. This cafe used to be one of those old residences.

These cafes are the places you go for the atmosphere in addition to your cup of coffee, which means the price isn't so cheap. This Canal Cafe by the river serves a cup of coffee for 500 yen.

Franchise Coffee Shops
The franchise coffee shop is where you go for some coffee plain and simple. The reasonable ones are, like in the US, are fast food franchises. You may be lucky and find McDonald's selling you a coffee for 100 yen while a promotion, though the regular price of their M (medium) size is 200+ yen.

If you like Starbucks, here's good news: they are all over in Japan. The cup sizes are smaller and they have a smaller size we don't have in the US. Pricing and menu items are reasonably close to their counterparts in the US.

I've never been in Starbucks in Japan so I can't tell how they are like but I often use these franchise shops of either Dotor Coffee ドトールコーヒー (doe-tor-kohee. Coffee is pronuced "Ko-hee" in Japanese), the price range for a cup of regular coffee is 200~300 yen; or Pronto or Exelcior Caffe'. Exelcior Coffe' is a division of Dotor mainly serve Italian capcino, it seems a bit more expensive than Dotor and Pronto.

Another franchise you find everywhere is Ko:hi:kan 珈琲館 (kohee-kan, Coffee-kan). It was an early coffee shop franchise, actually around during the kissaten era. They were focused on taste or different beans of coffee even in that time. They changed the business style and now they are close to the lower price coffee shop franchises. However, the prices are a bit higher and remain in the Kissaten range.

One of these franchises can usually be found around major train stations and city areas. There are similar low-priced local coffee shops mostly inside or near train stations. A great thing about these franchise coffee shops is that they serve snacks (pastries and sandwiches, both Japanese style and Western style) and even breakfast meals.

Lately, another type, a so-called Nagoya style of coffee shop, is becoming popular. At this kind of coffee shop they serve coffee with some kind of snack or sweet for the coffee price, the service is called "Mo-ningu モーニング (morning)". So mainly it's coffee (or soft drink) with a snack or sweet offered during breakfast hours. So the trend of this type came to be. A franchise "Komeda Coffee コメダ珈琲" is the major one so far. But as far as I remember, all kissaten in Tokyo had the Morning Service. It is the same as the Nagoya style, I think so I don't know why they use the word Nagoya for the service.

Another reasonable off shoot of the coffee shop is the family restaurant, ファミレス (fami-resu) is its nickname in Japan. The style is similar to an American diner. Actually, Denny's was an early one and is still one of the dominating fami-resu franchise chains in Japan. What you expect in a fami-resu isn't much different from a family restaurant in the US. They give you the menu with big photos (but the dishes are Japanese style). The layout of the tables and chairs are quite similar to the ones in the US. However, they offer something unique and nice: a self-service "dorinku baa ドリンクバー (drink bar)". You can have any kind of soft drinks, coffee and tea, as much as you want.

Some fami-resu places set a time limit for orders to prevent customers hanging around too long. Some of my friends bring their work to those fami-resu; they drink coffee while working on their PC, finish the work, have a casual meeting with clients, and eat dinner then go home. I wouldn't recommend this as an everyday practice, but it's not a bad idea! The space is bigger or convenient than a hotel room.

The drink bar service is also common in internet-cafes or manga-cafes. Japanese net cafes are usually small rooms or bays with a PC. The individual rooms are very small. I'm not big even by Japanese standards but I can't sit comfortably in that small confined space for too long. Usually, these net-cafe places carry tons of manga books. People read mangas or use a PC as needed, and are charged by the hour. Some manga cafes or the manga areas in net cafes are more open space than the rooms with a PC. In these places, you can use a PC or read manga (in Japanese though) and have access to the drink bar. Some places have a good coffee machine. In fact their coffee aren't bad for the service and price.

The above video is a commercial guide of a net cafe near Himeji City, a typical layout for a net/manga cafe.

Bento World - (Part 2 of 2)

駅弁 Ekiben

This is how we used to buy Ekiben in train stations. The seller came to the windows of the train and the passengers bought these "to go" meals from their seats. We didn't do this in the commuter trains, but it was still a big part of the fun of train travel. Unfortunately the train windows can't be opened nowadays, so that tradition was replaced with a new one. Now merchants sell the bentos in a booth on the platform or in the train station concourse.

Above is a video showing a classic train ride the way it used to be, with passengers riding the old trains and vendors selling bentos from the platform. I remember how they called out and walked along side the train windows. We always worried if we could catch one of the vendors, pay our money and grab the ekiben before the train started moving! We would wait to arrive at a certain station to get a certain Ekiben. We prepared coins for a quick exchange, arrived at the station and called out "Bento-ya saaaaan" from the open window. It was fun!

The first train in Japan ran from Tokyo (today's Shinbashi Station) to Yokohama (now Sakuragicho Station) on September 12, the 5th year of Meiji (10/14/1872). There are a few different theories about who sold the first Ekiben but for most agree it was at Utsunomiya Station in Tochigi Prefecture in 1885. The meal was simple; only a couple of onigiri (rice balls) and some pickles.

おにぎり Onigiri

In Japanese restaurants in the US, bento likely means a bento box. But bento in Japanese sense means food (most likely lunch but doesn't have to) brought from home. The "lunch box" type of sense developed and started to sell like Ekiben or conbini bento and so on. So now, you'll probably hear this conversation in a Japanese office around lunch time:

"おひるどうする" Ohiru doo suru? (What are you doing for lunch?)
"あー、今日はお弁当。" Ah, kyo wa obento. (Oh, today I brought my lunch.)

The bento here can be a sandwich, salad, or whatever we brought from home. It could also be something bought from a store or conbini on the way to work. You can also go out to buy a boxed lunch. In that case you'd say "I'm going out to buy a bento for lunch"; in this case the bento means a boxed lunch from a store. But you wouldn't hear bento used if someone is buying a sandwich or any other meal for some reason.

Among the lunch meals, one of our favorite is onigiri, meaning rice balls. You'll see a variety of onigiri in Japanese conbini as well as boxed bento. It's not much favored among Americans whom I personally know because it is mainly rice and kind of plain. Japanese LOVE lots of rice in this plain version! :D

The video above shows how to make rice balls. The way she washes the rice and cools down the rice to make the balls, and cuts the ingredients by scissors, some Japanese may not agree with but you'll get the idea.

空弁 Sora-ben

Sora-ben is another Japanese abbreviated word which is made out of 空 sora (sky) and 弁 ben (a kanji character from 弁当 bento) means the "sky" version of Ekiben. So the Sora-ben are sold by vendors at airports.

弁当男子 Bento Danshi

There used to be a time when lots of Japanese men just didn't cook. Samurai men even were actually prohibited from going into the kitchen! Though strangely enough, most professional cooks were men. Thankfully, times have changed. Lately, cooking is pretty popular pastime among guys. You'll see quite a few cook books for men in Japan. Guys who prepare their own lunches are called "Bento Danshi". It used to be that on the typical guy's wish list was finding a wife who was a good cook. Now, the tables have turned. Meeting a guy who can cook is the definition of a dream guy, and it's high on the wish list of many Japanese girls~!

Please see these Bento Danshi images from Google search.

In fact, these "____ danshi (boys)" or "____ joshi (girls)" are a sort of a trend. It's how you'd call certain types of boys/girls. Actually, it's not as big a trend as it once was, but the girls of Japan are "nikushoku joshi (meat-eater girls)" and "soshoku danshi (grass-eater boys)" and refers to a change happening in Japan: girls are getting tougher and boys are getting more gentle. Well, it may not sound so new in the States but it really does in Japan.

Bento - An Introduction (Part 1 of 2)

Bento ( 弁当 bentō ) is a single-portion takeout or home-packed meal that is still a common part of Japanese food culture. A traditional bento usually has compartments for foods like rice, fish or meat, and one or more pickled or cooked vegetables, and sometimes fruit. The bento is usually a box-shaped container. These containers come in all shapes, sizes, and qualities, from cheap disposable trays to expensive handcrafted lacquer ware. You can find bento, sometimes called "o-bento" or a "bento box", in many places around Japan, including convenience stores, bento shops (弁当屋 bentō-ya), train stations, and department stores. But in my view, some of the most creative bento I have seen are made by hand at home. Even today, it is still common for a Japanese parent or spouse to spend time and energy producing a carefully prepared homemade lunch box.

Bento can be very elaborately arranged in a style called kyaraben or "character bento". Kyaraben is typically decorated to look like popular Japanese cartoon (anime) characters, characters from comic books (manga), or video game characters. Another popular bento style is "oekakiben" or "picture bento", which is decorated to look like people, animals, buildings and monuments, or items such as flowers and plants. In Japan, contests are often held where bento artists compete for the most aesthetically pleasing bento creations.

A bento box can be created to delight a child and make their lunch experience that much better. It's as if they can taste the care and attention that went into creating this artisan lunch. I like to call it art you can eat. Some of the most adorable examples you'll find are in the Flickr category called Kawaii Bento (Cute Bento).

But bento are not just for kids. When I lived in Japan years ago, the salarymen I worked with would bring a bento to the office. Every day at twelve noon, all company members would go upstairs to the company cafeteria with a lunch bag or bento box. (It wasn't allowed to eat by yourself at your desk!) Some of the younger married men had stay at home wives who felt it was their duty to create a charming, healthy bento for their husband. We would sometimes smile or laugh when they opened their bento boxes, which often featured a compartment with white rice adorned with a romantic heart shape!

Types of Bento

Shōkadō bentō (松花堂弁当) is a traditional black lacquer bento box. This is a very traditional Japanese style of bento container. As a side note, this box was the inspiration for IBM's Thinkpad laptop design.

Chūka bentō (中華弁当) are filled with Chinese food. While Chinese do have cold plates, it is more for appetizers or midnight "snack". The food that is associated with Chūka bentō was invented in Japan.

Kamameshi bentō (釜飯弁当) are sold at train stations in Nagano prefecture. It is cooked and served in a clay pot. The pot is a souvenir item.

Hokaben (ホカ弁) is any kind of bento bought at a take-out bento shops. Freshly cooked hot (hokahoka) rice is usually served with freshly prepared side dishes. The name was popularized after a pioneering take-out bento franchise in the field, Hokka Hokka Tei.

Ekiben a bento sold at railway stations (eki) or onboard trains. There are many kinds of ekiben. Ekiben and other specialty bento will be covered in more detail in Part 2.

Bento, especially those originating from Japan, I've noticed, are arranged with healthy foods, and usually feature fruit for a dessert and never chips! They tend to be smaller portions too. In contrast, I have noticed American versions to be different somewhat, more adapted to US tastes -- fresh veggies might replace the pickled vegetables and dessert might include cookies or chocolate. Wherever they are from, one thing is common to all: the meals are fun, creative and appetizing.

To see lots of photos of bento lunches and read the blogs of bento fans, take a look at any of these links:

http://cookinggallery.blogspot.com/

http://bebento-kids.blogspot.com/

http://bentobliss.blogspot.com/

http://www.freewebs.com/bentobird

http://www.cutebento.com/

Navigate to: Flickr website.

Do a search for any of these groups to find many examples of bento box creations.

Kawaii Bento

Bento, Obento

Just Bento

Iron Bento

Bento Swap

Some these these food artists are from Japan, but many others are also joining in, from the United States, Canada, the UK, Italy and other origins. OBento fans can be found around the world!

Want to give creating o bento a try yourself? I like the Jbox online store. It’s fun to browse and check out authentic merchandisefrom Japan that is available for purchase. Their “Bento & Kitchen” category is a great place to start your search for bento boxes and supplies. Jbox writes this about the Kapibarasan Bento Box:

“Welcome to the Kapibarasan Cafe, where the coffee is always hot and the staff is always furry. This cute bento box features the adorable capybara characters that have become so popular in Japan recently. Create your own cute lunch-time bento with this adorable box that has a lid that clasps closed for extra security. The compartment holds 260ml (8.75oz). Completely machine washable and microwavable (with the cute character lid taken off). An official Japanese product that is made in Japan.”

Since you or someone you love will be eating from the container, I would recommend purchasing a bento box from Japan or another source that takes the manufacture of foodsafe merchandise as seriously as Japan does.

Some great items are also available on Etsy as well, such as bento bags, boxes, accessories and interesting bento- inspired items.

Mitsuwa Marketplace Check out Mitsuwa stores for bento supplies. This is a chain of supermarkets with locations in Chicago, Illinois, New Jersey and California.

By searching online you should be able to find all kinds of advice offered by people willing to teach you the art of bento. Even food companies can be helpful. Take a look at an interesting webpage by Nippon Ham Group, a Japan-based meat products company. They have an entire section devoted to instructing bento artists how to turn Nippon Ham Group ham and sausage products into lions, sharks, flowers and other decorations. The website is in Japanese, but the illustrations might give you some creative ideas.

Conbini Franchises in Japan

For those of who wonder about Conbini (konbini, コンビニ) or convenience store franchises in Japan, here is the list. The order below is according to sales as of April 2011 from Japanese Wikipedia.

1. Seven Eleven セブンイレブン

Take a look at this Seven Eleven TV commercial featuring members of AKB48, the idol girls unit consisting of 48 girls, all of whom competed for one of the treasured spots in this popular song and dance troupe. "AKB" is the term of abbreviation of AKihaBara. Akihabara is the huge shopping district in Tokyo catering to anime, electronics and gaming fans; it is also commonly called "Akiba". If you want to learn more, do an internet or YouTube search of Akihabara or AKB48).

The enterprise of Seven Eleven in Japan, Seven and Ai, also runs Ito Yokado (supermarkets) and Sogo/Seibu (department stores).

2. Lawson　ローソン

This is a commercial advertising the everyday goods they sell. From this ad you can see what the inside of a Japanese convenience store looks like.

The enterprise of Lawson is run by Daiei group, currently owned by Mitsubishi, a long time supermarket franchise chain. The English Wiki says Lawson originated in Ohio, USA. It seems there are no stores like this in the US now -- but about 10,000 of them are in Japan!

3. Family Mart ファミリーマート Nickname: Famima ファミマ


The enterprise of Family Mart, Seiyu group, is another supermarket franchise chain which currently consolidated with Itochu. It also owns am/pm, another convenience store franchise which looks a lot like a typical US convenience store.

The above three businesses each have about 10,000 franchise stores in Japan. Lawson and Family Mart are nationwide. I see Seven Eleven everywhere in Tokyo but it may not be in some other areas. There are quite a few local franchise chains as well but some of other major almost-nationwide franchises are:

- Circle K Thanks サークルKサンクス
- Ministop ミニストップ: this franchises have an eat-in corner in the store.
- Daily Yamazaki デイリーヤマザキ: this franchise business is run by a long-run bakery manufacturer Yamazaki Pan ("pan" means "bread" in Japanese). Lots these franchises used to be bakeries. So the tradition has carried on; they still sell bakery goods today.

I see convenience stores in Japan often at the spot where a bakery-sweets shop, liquor store or cigarette shop used to be. The stores selling cigarettes used to be a government licensed businesses (I think it is still but selling cigarettes used to be a government-run monopolized business in Japan) and each store had to be a certain distance from another store. It often was a tiny spot with an Obaasann (old lady) inside with a Neko (cat) over the counter, that was a typical scene of a Tabako-ya (tabaco shop) in Japan. Since the 70's vending machines gradually taken the place of such Tabako-ya businesses. I doubt most young people even know of these businesses. They may not even know the word. Now, most vending machines with cigarettes and alcohol drinks in Japan require an IC card to prove the age of the buyer. It is not very convenient for me as a short time visitor, but there are convenience stores everywhere so I can always drop in at one of them. Many train and bus stations usually have at least one shop for selling these items and most of them likely have at least one convenience store.

However, once I was with my family, I had a hard time. I used to live there but the area had changed quite a bit while I was away. I found vending machines but had no IC card, so I couldn't get a pack of cigarettes. (Yeah, I should quit smoking but it's not the subject here.) Anyway, I walked around a long time and decided to go to the train station area since they have a few Conbini around there. I took the way I used to walk to the station. The landscape very much changed but then I remembered there was a Tabako-ya up the street, so I walked on. There, in the same spot as in my fading memory, I found a perfect Tabako-ya with Obaasan and Neko.

I was too young to visit her store when I walked there everyday so I never knew her and the store at all, but it was right there as the everyday scene which always just passed by in the corner of my eye. The Obaasan, very tiny, about the same size as her sitting on her knees over the counter (well, I probably need an explanation here too. Over the tiny store counter, there is a rather tiny tatami room. Obaasan and Neko are sitting there together on the tatami floor, not on a chair). She let me come in and view the inventory section of the tiny store, talking about the weather and stuff for traditional greeting, explaining the brands I am no longer familiar with, thanked me so many times for buying a pack of cigarettes. I felt, I should pay more for this wonderful customer service! I wish I could have stayed there longer.... really.

Convenience store clerks in Japan are generally very polite and nice, which I like, but they are trained to act in accordance with a strict manual. I respect the manual working well but a tiny complaint I have about it is, the less than human communication, especially for non-regulars. Everywhere they give me the same set of words. They really sell convenience which is good and I like it but sometimes, I'd love to have personal atmosphere a bit more.

Well, if I were to encounter it during my morning commute, I'd surely lose patience with the Obaasan's long talking and slow motion exchange of merchandise and money. But the good thing is, such personal slow businesses still exists in Japan. I'll show you more of both -- "slow business" and "fast business" -- in future posts.