The “Future” of the Delicatessen Industry: Overcoming Corona with “Specializing in Love Dolls” and “Uber-Delicatessen
In the past, whenever faced with a crisis, brothels managed to find a way to survive. It was the same with the COVID-19 crisis. In the second part of this series, sex industry journalist Akira Ikoma explains the current situation and future prospects of the delicatessen operators that survived the COVID-19 crisis.
Unique delicatessens continue to appear despite the COVID-19 crisis.
The COVID-19 crisis has made it difficult for the sex industry to survive, but the brothels have shown surprising resilience and toughness. In the deli-help industry, a number of stores took the pinch as an opportunity and came up with a variety of new business ideas.
Immediately after the Corona outbreak, deli-help agencies appeared all over the country offering masks as gifts to customers because of the shortage of masks. A certain delivery esthetic salon also began offering masks, which proved popular with customers and boosted sales. The effect was so great that women also liked the mask service, and the number of applications from women increased.
A number of stores with anti-Corona measures were also introduced one after another. In April 2008, the popular “Shine Shinjuku” in Shinjuku opened a system that allows customers to play with delirious women online. The system allowed one-on-one sexually explicit live chat with delirious girls. In Ikebukuro, a delicatessen specializing in real love dolls called “Uber Doll” appeared. The selling point was that there was no risk of corona infection when dealing with dolls.
In Osaka, a delicatessen called “Mikosuri Handojo Osaka” opened, offering “just ‘hand service’ at the entrance,” with a short, low rate of 3,000 yen for five minutes. The store does not accept reservations over the phone. The service is completely online, with no phone calls accepted, and women arrive by car, train, foot, or any other means. It was truly the “Uber Eats of the adult entertainment industry.
A delicatessen called “Corona Depression Girls” also emerged, which was only possible in the midst of the COVID-19 crisis. Under the concept of “people who are in need of money due to Corona work,” reservations were called “support,” and customers were called “supporters.” The store was set up by a former member of the Self-Defense Forces with the intention of “saving women in poverty,” but it was controversial, with criticisms on social networking sites such as, “They prey on women who have no choice but to work in Corona.
These stores were often the talk of the town immediately after opening, but soon closed. The exception was Mikosuri Handoba, which is now a nationwide group.
Around September ’22, when the COVID-19 crisis began to abate, moves to ease restrictions on the entry of foreign visitors to Japan accelerated. Inbound travelers came back to life, and the number of delicatessens that accepted them became conspicuous. The overall characteristic is that the prices are set at a premium, and some stores have emerged that strongly advertise kimono costume play, which is favored by foreigners.
The movement to attract well-paying foreign customers expanded. More and more stores advertise on websites introducing sex stores for foreigners, and stores specializing in inbound entertainment opened one after another in Sapporo, Nagoya, Kyoto, and other places in Japan. Demand for inbound sex services is increasing every year, and this trend is expected to continue.
Rush of openings continues despite saturation
New delicatessen establishments continue to open across the country. In Reiwa 2024, there were 22,761 non-storefront sexually oriented businesses registered, far ahead of the 6,651 storefront businesses. The total number of sex-related special business is 33,890, and business trip-type sex establishments have come to account for about 67% of the total, making it the largest market in the sex industry by far.
Even in the ’20s, when the market has long since become saturated, manual books on starting a delicatessen business have been published one after another, with such claims as, “You can earn 10 million yen a year even if you operate a single store, and a billion yen if you operate multiple stores,” “Achieve 1 billion yen in annual sales in 3 years of business,” and “Achieve 1 million yen in monthly income even with no experience. ‘ In the past 25 years, a book on the entrepreneurial experience of an amateur male in his 50s who left the workforce to start his own business has even appeared. The fact that new stores continue to open in this saturated delicatessen industry probably means that there is still a dream of getting rich quick.
However, while many new stores are opening, many are also closing. Many of them have lost their websites before we know it. It is said that 70-80% of newly opened brothels close or go out of business within a year.
It is good when the business is booming and attracting customers, but when it enters a period of stagnation, operations instantly become difficult. Sales are sluggish, business growth comes to a halt, and management comes to a standstill. If the causes are not identified and broken down, the business will gradually enter a trend of decline. Sales decline, advertising effectiveness slows, and the ability to attract customers through SNS comes to a head. Cast member retention rates are declining and recruiting costs are increasing. The atmosphere on the shop floor becomes heavy and problems increase. As these conditions continue, the company gradually runs out of options and is forced to close.
A man who has been involved in the management of a delicatessen for 10 years has learned four things from the ups and downs of the industry : “There is no prosperity without women’s satisfaction,” “If you stick to the success story, the decline will begin,” “A system is more important than advertising,” and “If management and the front line are divided, the business will break up in midair. The ups and downs of the delicatessen industry have taught him these four things.
The characteristics of delicatessens that close or go out of business are “being stingy with equipment and advertising,” “a rapid turnover of women,” and “internal divisions caused by money,” etc. When a delicatessen becomes “anything goes,” such as letting in poor quality customers or encouraging excessive service from women, thinking “…… is better than going out of business,” it is said to be in its final stages. When the situation becomes “anything goes”, it is said to be a terminal symptom.
Even though the delhi helper industry has entered a period of stagnation in which the market is not expanding, it is the long-established establishments that have not been so damaged. Long-established establishments that have been loved for a long time have customers known as “regulars,” and can expect stable sales. As prices remain high and the population continues to decline, it is obvious that new customers alone will no longer be enough to make ends meet, and repeat customers will undoubtedly become more important.
Will Fuzoku Esthetic Business Surpass Delhi Helicopter Service?
Among business travel-type sex establishments, “sex esthetic salons” are the fastest-growing type of business today. This is because women and customers are flowing from men’s esthetic salons, which are more likely to be exposed due to this year’s revision of the Entertainment Establishments Control Law, to sexually oriented esthetic salons. People who are worried about working or playing in men’s esthetic salons, which are legally gray, are shifting to the legal and safe sex industry.
There is also room for growth. There are still many illegal esthetic salons where Chinese and Koreans secretly provide sexual services, although they are ostensibly disguised as healthy esthetic salons. It is highly likely that these will be exposed in the future as a result of stricter crackdowns, and people from the illegal foreign esthetic industry will flow into the sex industry market.
This is why the sex industry is expected to grow significantly in the future. Since regulations make it difficult to enter the store-type market, the market for delivery-type sex esthetic clinics is expected to explode in the future.
In addition, we have recently seen a change in the trends of major delivery esthetic groups. In the ’00s and ’10s, there were many cases of major groups of shop-style sex clubs opening delicatessen stores, but in the ’20s, cases of major groups of delicatessen companies expanding into shop-style sex clubs became prominent in Tokyo, Yokohama, Nagoya, Osaka, etc. This reversal of the trend occurred because of the number of delicatessen groups that opened shops in each area. This reversal phenomenon seems to have occurred because the deli-help groups in each region have matured over the years and have gained more leeway.
Compared to the saturated delicatessen market, where competition to attract customers is fierce, there are fewer, locally based storefront sex clubs, which have many old and familiar customers, and thus the operators feel more secure in their operations. It is a dream of sex industry managers to manage a storefront brothel, and many sex industry professionals believe that “a delicatessen without a physical storefront is no match for a storefront with customers in the city”.
The “future” of delicatessen services continues to evolve.
Since its introduction in 1999, the delicatessen industry has evolved, changing its form as society has changed and technology has advanced. Its history is an example of how the sex industry is adapting to changes in regulations and technology.
Saturation will continue, and many delicatessens will be eliminated. Not only delinquent stores, but also those operating soundly will find it difficult to survive on their own. They need to be attractive enough to attract customers to choose them out of the many stores. In order to create such an attraction, the growth of delicatessen girls and male staff is indispensable.
First, they must obey the law and pay taxes. Then, they must improve the quality of their business, including “customer service” and “store management. If the number of quality stores increases, the industry will become healthier and working conditions will be improved. The support system in case of trouble should also be strengthened.
Consideration for the people around them is a prerequisite for survival, such as “not causing trouble to the owner or manager of the condominium where the office or waiting area is located,” “eliminating bad manners such as early morning and late night noise and long hours of street parking,” and “not causing trouble with the local residents.
The stores that do the “natural things,” such as respecting their neighbors, being punctual, and engaging in friendly competition to enhance customer satisfaction, and that win the hearts and minds of many customers with their excellent management techniques and innovative ideas will surely sustain and develop the deli-help industry in the years to come.
In this series of articles, we have described the history of the business trip sex industry in the postwar period over the course of five articles. The type of business has changed over time, from call girls right after the war, to hoteliers at the end of the Showa period, to delicatessen in the Heisei period and beyond, but the major attraction that customers have, the excitement of waiting to see what kind of woman will arrive, has remained constant.
The business of “delivering the opposite sex to the customer for sexual services” will continue to evolve in the future. We cannot help but look forward to the appearance of new, revolutionary stores that will exceed the imaginations of many people.
References.
A Modern History of Fuzoku,” Akira Ikoma, Seidansha Publico, 2022.
Corona and Fuzoku-Josha (Corona and Fuzoku-Josha), Takaaki Yagisawa, Soshisha, 2021.
Shintai corona to futsuzoku joshi (New type of corona and poor girls),” Nakamura Atsuhiko, Takarajimasya, 2020
In addition, numerous other books and online media were referenced.
Interview, text, and photographs： Akira Ikoma