The Japanese king of Vietnamese restaurants

One man's mania for Vietnam

“I’m crazy about Vietnam and that passion has helped me succeed,” says Mr Miyamoto.

He has visited Vietnam many times and originally opened a shop selling Vietnamese souvenirs before entering the “world of Vietnamese food’ four years ago. At the time, a wave of Japanese visiting Vietnam was beginning and many became fans of Vietnamese pho, bun bo (beef noodle), nem cuon and others.

 
But there were o­nly a few Vietnamese restaurants in Tokyo and a few other cities at the time. Some large supermarkets also began selling Vietnamese food, but o­nly at small volume.

 
Seeing the potential, Mr Miyamoto decided to invest in the field and started with a small restaurant in central Tokyo. “The sources of supplies to produce Vietnamese food and decorate Vietnamese cuisine are abundant, while the material prices are cheap, so I decided to quickly open a Vietnamese restaurant,” he said.

 
However, the first step was the hardest. In the early days, the restaurant didn’t have many customers because it didn’t meet Vietnamese standards. So Miyamoto went to Vietnam to study the cuisine and to invite professional Vietnamese chefs to work at his restaurant.

 
“For many picky Japanese people, o­nly Vietnamese chefs and Vietnamese materials will do them, otherwise they will visit the restaurant for o­ne time o­nly,” Miyamoto said. His restaurant not o­nly had Vietnamese chefs, but also Vietnamese waiters studying in Japan. Most materials were also imported from Vietnam.

 
When his customers increased markedly, Miyamoto opened a second restaurant, then a third… and now the 30^th after four years, with a total of over 300 Vietnamese staff. Those restaurants had a turnover of US$35mil last year.

 
What made them develop so quickly? “That’s because Vietnamese cuisines are so attractive. Some customers told me that their facial skin is better thanks to eating Vietnamese cuisine,” the restauranteur revealed. Most Vietnamese dishes have vegetables, and that’s the main factor attracting Japanese women.

 
A special serving style

 
Each day Keiichi Miyamoto’s restaurants welcome around 6,000 customers, many who have never been to Vietnam or know much about the country.

 
“I often tell my Vietnamese staff that Vietnamese people are good-hearted, sincere and open-minded, so you should show those characteristics to customers, not o­nly through your faces and gestures but by the whole heart. Thus, they will return to our restaurant,” Miyamoto said.

After gaining success in Japan with Vietnamese food, Miyamoto now plans to do the same thing in Vietnam with Japanese food. In early December 2005, he inaugurated Kacyo, a restaurant at Ngo Van Nam Street, District 1, HCM City, selling tepanyaki, a kind of Japanese beefsteak.

 
“Through Kacyo Restaurant we want to introduce to Vietnamese people a unique food of Japan,” he said.

 
Using the model of restaurants in Japan, he decorates Kacyo with materials from his home country and employs o­nly Japanese chefs, adding however that the ultimate goal when investing in Vietnam is not restaurants but processing Vietnamese food.

 
“We will establish seafood and agricultural processing establishments with investment capital of around US$2-3mil to provide for our restaurants in Japan,” he revealed.

 
“Our surveys show that many unprocessed Vietnamese agricultural and seafood products have prices that are ten times lower than those in Japan, so we believe that we will succeed if investing in this area,” he confirmed.