The popularity of the automated belts took a hit due to hygiene concerns during the Covid-19 pandemic and pranks by customers. - PIXABAY
TOKYO: Rotating conveyor belts, a once iconic staple of sushi-chain restaurants in Japan, are quickly sliding into history.
While the decline is not new, the popularity of the automated belts took a hit due to hygiene concerns during the Covid-19 pandemic and pranks by customers, according to Japanese news outlet Asahi Shimbun.
Choushimaru Co, which operates about 80 sushi outlets in the Tokyo metropolitan area, opened a renovated outlet in October 2023 with no conveyor belts, with workers at the branch told that they should add value by talking to customers, and place importance on serving customers with a human touch.
The conveyor belts were invented in 1958 to reduce labour costs for sushi restaurants allowing many customers to be served quickly, Asahi Shimbun said.
But food that sat on the belt for too long would lose their freshness, with restaurants having to bear the cost of disposing off the stale food, the news outlet said.
The issue was mitigated by introducing ordering systems which allowed customers to order freshly prepared sushi delivered on a conveyor belt such as at the Hama-Sushi and Kappa Sushi chains, greatly helping to reduce wastage.
The Covid-19 pandemic increased customers’ wariness towards germs spreading on exposed food, while a series of incidents in 2023 where pranksters recorded themselves licking utensils, soy sauce bottles, teacups and even food on the conveyor belts, led customers to shun restaurants serving food on such belts.
The restaurants had to take measures such as replacing these items on the conveyor belt each time a new customer came in.
But a representative for Choushimaru told Asahi Shimbun that the pranks were not the main reason behind the decision to stop serving dishes on conveyor belts, adding that it was catering to the changing trends among customers.
Another chain, Kura Sushi, which still serves dishes on a rotating conveyor belt, responded by installing an artificial intelligence camera system which can register suspicious actions such as when a plate is briefly taken from a conveyor belt and put back.
“In any case, we must keep the sushi rotating. That is our raison d’etre,” the company said.
Others like industry giant Akindo Sushiro are replacing conveyor belts with touchscreen monitors at each table showing animated images of its dishes on a conveyor belt.
Introduced at three of its outlets in October 2023, the 150cm by 50cm screens are dubbed Digiro – short for Digital SushiroVision.
Koichi Mizutome, president of Food & Life Companies Ltd., Akindo Sushiro’s parent company, said the future of conveyor belt sushi depends on customers’ choice between the go-round style and the order-based style.
“Trials have been made over the past one or two years, and I think things will come down to one of the two,” he added. - The Straits Times/ANN
