ABOUT US／2
Difficulty of starting from “zero”
Although we started our own shop, which was our dream, and worked very hard every day, our sales were not going well.
When we were working at my father-in-law’s shop, whenever we created new sweets, the number of customers naturally increased and sales also increased …I think we just assumed that if we opened the shop customers would come without doing anything special.But we came to realize that starting from nothing is totally different to selling sweets at a long-established shop, and it is a very difficult thing.
But one day, when I was watching a comedy show on TV, I heard a phrase the comedian was saying,
“When I wasn’t popular, I was always concerned about how I could make customers laugh and how I could get more work. But when I started talking in the way I was and how I wanted, work became fun for me and I started getting more work offers.”This made me realize something important.
We were also struggling under the pressure of having both feelings of “wanting make delicious sweets” and “doing business well…” When we started running our own shop, things we never imagined before were crossing our mind.
“How can we sell well?” and “These sweets take too much time and effort to make profitable” etc…, because I was always concerned about these things, I might’ve become unable to deal with sweets head-on.
Fruit tart of happiness
“What do I do from here? Which direction should I go?” At that time when I was seeking a way to go, I always made a fruit tart to celebrate my family members’ birthday.“How can I surprise my children and make them happy?” While thinking like this, I used a lot of fruits and decorated the tart beautifully. I, myself, actually enjoyed making it.When I brought it to the table, my children went “WOWWW” and when they ate it, they said “It’s SOOOO yummy!” with big smiles on their faces.
Even if I was tired from work, when I saw their smiles, my tiredness went away and I became happy, too.
Then I realized. This brought my original thought back into my mind, “I just want my customers to have delicious sweets” and “I want to make sweets that make my customers smile.”
This was the perfect timing for me to go back to my original roots.
With a new mind set, I decided that from that time on, “I just want to make delicious sweets.”In that moment, all the unnecessary thoughts and emotions that were like a cloudy sky disappeared leaving a clear sky.With this new way of thinking, I made sweets with the image of my customers smiling in my head and work became fun.
“If I start selling this fruit tart in my shop and make my customers happy as well…,” while thinking this, I decided to go ahead and make it an official product.
Since then the fruit tart became our popular product, and we started seeing many customers enjoy it with a big smile on their faces.
It was a moment when I whole-heartedly thought, “I’m so glad I became a patissier.” After that, we created new products one after another, including our peach tart and busse with fresh chocolate cream.
“How can I make it tastier?” rather than “How do I make it sell?”
Should I put more cream in? Does it need a little more moisture? Should I bake it a little longer?
Our conversations turned to be all about how we could make the taste better. We strived for the best taste every single day.
We moved forward together as a family
Our original focus on sweets making was always as a family.
My older sister was diagnosed with muscular dystrophy when she was 19 years old and she has been fighting this disease since then.She has been confronted with that disease and living each day to the fullest. We all respect my sister so much.
My wife says, “Your sister has always been my emotional support, and she made me realize that I should never forget to be thankful, which has played an important role in both making sweets and raising my children.”
“I want to cherish time with my family more,” this desire made me decide to start our own business.Because I often left home alone when I was young, I wanted to raise my children in an environment where they were close with their grandparents.My wife accepted my desire without any resistance.My mother-in-law cared greatly about us and allowed us to start our own business. Without support from my family, I wouldn't be who I am now.
Family is the most important thing for me.I also want to share such feelings of thankfulness and caring with my customers.
I don’t want to just be a business person, instead I want to be someone who doesn’t only seek profit but also always aims to give everyone happiness and enjoyment.
Smiles and thankfulness for the future
After that, we started receiving TV and magazine coverage and the number of customers gradually increased.
In 2012, we renovated the 3.3 square meter shop into the current shop “Nakatsu Sweets Kanei.”
There was no car park with the previous shop, but in addition to this, I wasn’t feeling completely satisfied with selling sweets, especially new products, in a small space.
Because the place where I had my apprenticeship was a Japanese sweets shop, it was normal for me to think of having a shop decorated in Japanese style until then. But when we did the renovation, we decided to apply our own taste and way of looking at things. Now we keep it in our mind to be ourselves for both shop interiors and the product range.
Our answer which we finally got after the everyday struggles is that “The best thing is to make our customers happy.”
No matter how much time and effort is needed, we should make and offer our customers tasty sweets, which we honestly think are tasty.
Nothing makes me happier than the moment when our customers forget about their busy daily life, feel a little happiness and put smiles on their faces when they have Kanei’s sweets.
We will continue to make sweets to make them smile.
Thank you for reading our story up until the end.
And, we appreciate your continuous support for Nakatsu Sweets Kanei.
Shop owner Hirakawa