A “Taiwan Fair” taking place at Keio Department Store Shinjuku in Tokyo, Japan, has reported a sales performance almost as high as the most popular Hokkaido Fair.
In celebration of Keio Department Store Shinjuku’s 60th anniversary, the department store is holding a Taiwan-themed “Keio Taiwan Night Market,” featuring Taiwanese street cuisine, from Thursday last week until tomorrow.
Coinciding with a three-day weekend in Japan, the fair attracted a massive crowd. The organizer said that it had set a sales performance goal of ￥30 million (US$196,136) over six days, but it has made more than ￥20 million in the first three days, and many food stalls are sold out by early evening.
Photo: Lin Tsuei-yi, Taipei Times
The Keio Department Store’s management has in recent years invited many Taiwanese food brands to open up shops in its department stores, including cooperating with a company under Taiwan’s Yummy-Town Group (雅茗天地集團) to open Taiwanese tea shops in Japan.
The department store has a rich experience of holding the Hokkaido Fair and Ekiben (railway bento) Fair annually. This was the first year that the “Taiwan Fair” has been held.
The “Keio Taiwan Night Market” consists of 30 Taiwanese restaurants and retailers, including 25 carefully selected by Lin, such as Uni-President Enterprises Corp (統一企業), Dian Shui Lou (點水樓) restaurant by Namchow Group (南僑集團) and the more than a century-old Len Jen Bakery (連珍) from Keelung.
They also include Di Chun (帝鈞) Pepper Bun from Taichung’s Fengjia Night Market (逢甲夜市), the Happy Lemon (快樂檸檬) beverage chain and the Hung Rui Chen (洪瑞珍) sandwich store, among others. Some have already opened shops in Japan after surviving the low-sales period during the COVID-19 pandemic.
Of the local food fairs held at department stores in Japan, the Hokkaido Fair has always been the most popular and is seen as a guaranteed sales success, so many department stores routinely hold a Hokkaido Fair.
As Taiwanese food has become popular in Japan in recent years, some department stores have tried holding Taiwanese food markets.
Last year, Tobu Department Store held a market that served local food from Taiwan and Hokkaido. The sales performance of the Taiwanese food was almost as high as that of the Hokkaido food.
Yummy-Town Group’s representative in Japan Lin Tai-yi (林太一) said the Taiwan Fair achieved a sales performance of up to ￥21 million in the first three days on Thursday through Saturday.
Although it rained in Tokyo on Saturday, this did not stop customers from visiting the fair, so the sales exceeded ￥8 million, Lin added.
At the fair, many Taiwanese food stalls have launched limited-edition products, such as Happy Lemon’s Taiwanese shaved ice with condensed milk and mango, Len Jen Bakery’s sweet taro Mont Blanc ice cream and Dian Shui Lou’s crispy fried sparerib noodles.
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