Asian markets gain in Costa Mesa

Christine Carrillo

Costa Mesa has long served as the prime location for specialty

businesses catering to Japanese and Asian customers throughout Orange

County, a distinction that has become more pronounced with recent

openings.

Although the Asian and Pacific Islander population in 2000

consisted was only 6% of the Newport-Mesa area and 13.8% of the total

Orange County population, according to the U.S. 2000 Census, Costa

Mesa has proven that its centrality can lure Asian, particularly

Japanese, customers to the area.

The 13-year-old Mitusuwa Market on Paularino Avenue and Bristol

Street and the 7-month-old Marukai Asian Supermarket on Harbor

Boulevard and Baker Street offer convenient locations for customers

seeking Japanese, Asian and Hawaiian products.

“We are a special grocery store and we do have our customer base

already set up,” said Michael Yamamoto, general manager of the

Marukai Asian Supermarket. “Now it’s just a matter of introducing our

product to the area.”

Sixty percent of the supermarket’s clientele is of Japanese

decent. Its profile in the community was enhanced by the opening of

the Kinokuniya Bookstore right around the corner. The bookstore,

which sells Japanese books, magazines, DVDs, comics and other related

materials, brought more Japanese customers to the area. That, in

turn, brought business to the nearby Japanese supermarket as well.

While the two stores have helped each other’s business within the

Japanese communities, the proximity is not essential to the success

of a specialty store.

The Mitusuwa Market, which is the only Japanese business in its

area, has remained successful by expanding the kinds of products it

sells. Selling Oriental foods as well as books and other culturally

related products, the market has managed to continue to attract

Japanese customers and build up its non-Japanese clientele.

“We mostly sell oriental foods,” said George Nagano, manager of

the Mitusuwa Market. “And we’re trying to cater to the American

people that like to buy certain Japanese food.”

Trying to build a larger non-Japanese customer base remains the

primary goal for all three businesses.

“We would like more of [the non-Japanese] customers,” Yamamoto

said. “It hurts us a little bit because they’re not familiar with the

product, so we’re doing what we can do to try to educate the public.”

Education has served as the best means for such specialty

businesses to create a wider appeal and a develop a more localized

clientele.

“There are a lot of people that take vacations in Hawaii in these

affluent areas and can buy the same things here that they had there,

and the same thing goes for the Japanese food,” Yamamoto said. “There

are certain things they need to cook their Japanese food, and the

main thing that we’ve been doing right now is trying to teach

customers the restaurants’ type of Japanese foods.”

Because the products each of these businesses sell is exclusive to

Japanese culture, the owners do fear alienating the non-Japanese

clientele.

But the Marukai Asian Supermarket offers Japanese cooking classes,

and the owners of Kinokuniya Bookstore hope to begin a series of

Origami classes for those less familiar with the culture.

“In Asian countries they carry many English books,” Nagashima

said. “Many Japanese people are very comfortable with American

culture. We hope both Japanese and non-Japanese people will come and

bring their two cultures together.”