Mon, Jan 21, 2008 page11

• FEATURE: Plastic food market carves out a niche

  NOT JUST A PRETTY PLATE Orders surged in the plastic food business in 2003, but have since dropped, leaving companies looking for other creative ways to expand

  • By Joyce Huang / STAFF REPORTER
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  Have you been caught with your mouth watering in front of the food displays outside of restaurants and then realized they were plastic? Well, you're not alone. Rumor has it a Japanese housewife once even picked up some model vegetables at the market and brought them home before finding they were not real.

  Plastic food platters, often made of resin, are likened to "super models" in the restaurant and catering services industries and help attract diners who have bigger eyes than stomachs.

  "I would say that half of my clients are attracted by the plastic food showcased in the window outside," said Hsu Lung-yuan (徐榮源), a manager at a Singa (聖加南洋小品) shop, a food chain specializing in South Asian delicacies.

  

  Plastic food platter models are seen in a display room at Taiwan Saikyo International Co on Friday. Plastic food has become a key part of the restaurant decor because it can ''look so authentic it rouses the appetite,'' restaurant owners say.

  PHOTO: CHEN TSE-MING, TAIPEI TIMES

  Hsu said the other half of his patronage at the Taipei shop comes in on word of mouth.

  Hsu thinks the plastic food was a good investment -- at NT$3,000 (US$93) to NT$5,000 per bowl -- considering his restaurant opened only three months ago on Nan Chang Street (南昌街) and has already reached NT$7 million in revenue.

  He said that plastic food is important and is becoming a part of the restaurant decor because it can "look so authentic it rouses the appetite."

  

  A plastic cake model is seen at Taiwan Saikyo International Co on Friday.

  PHOTO: CHEN TSE-MING, TAIPEI TIMES

  But, on the other hand, plastic food that is overdone or carelessly done can backfire and disgust customers who may feel ripped off if the food doesn't taste as good as it looks, said Hsu, who has been in the food service industry for more than two decades.

  Hsu said that all the restaurants he has worked for take advantage of the so-called "three-dimensional menus" -- a marketing strategy that has been in place in Japan for more than seven decades.

  To prepare for what Hsu call "pop-out menus," restaurants have to provide manufacturers with photos from many different angles and sometimes real dishes for silicone molding.

  After that it takes anywhere from a few days to a full month to complete the pieces, depending on the manufacturer's schedule and the dish's level of complexity, said Oshiro Chiho, manager at Taiwan Saikyo International Co (台灣西京國際公司).

  "More importantly, skilled hands make all the difference between turning out realistic pieces that rouse your appetite and those phony ones that upset it," Oshiro said, adding that her company spends almost five years to train a good hand.

  The manufacturer still uses an apprentice program and has four skilled craftsmen on board.

  Operating in Taiwan since 1997, Saikyo enjoyed the advantages of being one of the first movers in the market after setting up a factory in Shanghai in 1995.

  Raw material and technology are directly imported from Japan while the products are manufactured in Shanghai and assembled in Taipei to meet the high standards demanded by its Taiwanese customers such as Azabusabo food chains (麻步茶房) and Yin Yi Restaurant (銀翼餐廳), she said.

  "The secret to success is the ingredient formula, which allows us to create a fluid jelly-like texture for plastic food," Oshiro said, adding that is why the company does not compete with rivals on price.

  Although the manufacturer said it can duplicate 98 percent of all food platters on a one-to-one scale, there are some limits.

  If a food texture is too soft, such as Tanaka House's (田中家) chiffon cake, it may make it difficult for the restaurant to even make a silica gel mold to begin the process, Oshiro said. Coloring is another important skill that takes time to perfect.

  Saikyo's business jumped 20 percent in 2003 -- one year before Taipei 101 was launched -- but has dropped 30 percent in recent years on a sluggish economy and with a major rival eating up market share, the manager said.

  Saikyo is confident in the competitiveness of its own tailor-made products and, therefore, has refused to enter price competition with the rival, run by a former employee. The two take up the majority of market share in Taiwan.

  Ex-Saikyo vice president Noriaki Nagaya jumped ship and started his own shop Taiwan Yenching Industry Co (台灣岩井實業) in 2003, teaming up with 51-year-old Iwai, a food sample company in Osaka, Japan, founded by Iwai Minoru.

  Despite being a latecomer, Yenching aims for bigger business in Taiwan.

  As a former executive at rival Saikyo, Nagaya knows all about Saikyo's pricing and his company attempts to edge out its rival with cheaper prices in the local marketplace.

  "I don't think the local market is oversaturated," he said. "It's all about how we tap into fields outside of meal samples, such as the bakery industry, to expand business."

  Reaching "more than NT$10 million in annual sales," Yenching has further transformed itself into a food-sample exporter by supplying plastic cigars to a British company and meat bun models to an African company.

  "We have sample orders from overseas markets such as Singapore, Hong Kong and the US, which account for about 10 percent of our sales," Nagaya said.

  Nagaya sees no limit for what his firm can manufacture -- anything as small as a chocolate bean to as big as a smoked duck is fair game -- saying the company dares to take on the challenge of cabbage or chiffon cake models that rivals say are difficult to manufacture.

  He said that his chocolate beans look so real that one of his friends only found the difference when he tried to chew one.

  "Skills are the key," he said, adding that the company had successfully boosted its yield rate from 80 percent to 90 percent.

  Sample food models originated in Osaka in 1932, the brainchild of Japanese businessman Iwasaki Luruzo, who began the industry's mass production, Nagaya said.

  It has become not only part of Japan's food culture, but also part of its tourism business with some 170 stores lining a Tokyo tourist block selling nothing but plastic food sample-related gadgets such as key chains and flash memory drives.

  After 70 years, the food sample industry in Japan might have shown signs of slowing down, but food samples continue to catch eyes.

  "Very often, customers can't help but stop to take a look at the models before they decide what to eat," Nagaya said.

  But what Nagaya doesn't deny is that, despite the industry's seven-decade history, it still has problems entering the doors of top-tier restaurants, where wealthy customers pay big money to be wined and dined.

  "The moment you see plastic food models, you know you are either in a common food court or at a restaurant with value-priced foods," said Yeh Yi-lan (葉怡蘭), a Taipei-based gourmet writer.

  Fancy restaurants, which seek innovations in either cooking or eating fashions, often find plastic samples a failure since no models, no matter how delicate they are, can truly convey their image to higher-end clientele, Yeh said.

  To address this weakness, Nagaya said that his company is putting effort into beefing up its capabilities in "designs and novelty."

  But before then, plastic food sample makers can only try to tap into different food sectors to expand business.

  Still, Yeh is positive about plastic food models and says that most of the items on the market are getting more and more vivid.

  "Not only do they stimulate the appetite, well-made plastic food can help people make decisions [about what to eat]," she said.

  They are particularly helpful to foreigners who come to a new country without knowing anything about its food culture or dish contents, she said.
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