After reading the essay, “Why are there so many small shops in Japan?,” by James Mak and Shyam Sunder, I was given an opportunity to go to an area nearby Kichijoji Station where numerous small shops were situated throughout the labyrinth of narrow alleys. As the authors mention in the essay, the shops at Kichijoji were small in scale, usually about a room size. Usually, the shops were occupied by one or a couple of shopkeepers, who were pleasantly welcoming and helpful.

The purpose of the fieldtrip was to see if the essay is actually true in contemporary era. However, one aspect that should be considered is that the essay was written more than ten years ago, which fails to provide updated information. As one of the reasons why Japan has many small shops, the essay recounts that “limited storage” of average Japanese households and Japanese preference for “fresh food” are the main reasons. The small shop complex was located right by the train station, which facilitated easy and convenient access. However, it was not clear whether the small shops had fresher goods than bigger supermarkets. For instance, there was a shop that sells raw fish in the marketplace. The goods were in the refrigerator, but it was hard to define whether they were fresh. Considering that there were only handful people in the marketplace, it was hard to know how long the goods were on display, which would have been written on the label along with other information such as ‘best before’ at a big mart.

Small Japanese shops were protected by various measures by the government, which regulated the creation of mega marts. However, these measures started waning due to economic pressure from domestic and foreign conglomerates. Starting from Large-Scale Retail Store Law in 1991, the government initiated to deregulate the measures that prevented the creation of bigger stores. While I saw this as a retrospective step that may devastate the small shops, the small shops had their own way of surviving. The small shops have their history, heritage, tradition and the relationship with the clienteles. Especially the restaurants have their own specialties that cannot be found at mass food chains or mega marts. Even if it is the same miso ramen, each ramenya I have been to had their way of bringing out the flavor of the original ingredients. However, the retail shops at the small shop complex near Kichijoji sell generic products that can easily be found in any other supermarket. The only difference is that the goods at those small stores were more expensive. Therefore, as a sensible customer, I would definitely buy at a supermarket, when it comes to generically manufactured products.

One of the biggest things that stood out as soon as I entered the alley was that most of the shops were closed. Apart from a few retail stores, only cloth shops and restaurants were open. Considering that the time was one in the afternoon, I could tell that the shops were not in a good business. Cloth shops had designer clothes, usually by not-so-famous individuals. The style of cloths was rather different from mass-produced ones. At one store, it had Levi’s jeans from 1970s on sale, which could not easily be found at a retail shop. By differentiating and specializing through individualizing their shops, small shops in Japan still have their appeal against the big ones. But, if they start to lose their charm by stocking mass-produced goods, I believe small shops will lose their grounds in near future.

Big marts so-called supermarket is a symbol of consumerism, which is one of the biggest components of modernism. Ever since steam engine was invented, human race has been producing and consuming at a great rate. Contrastingly, small shops represent traditional era where village communities were self-sufficient. Japan has achieved modernization in such a short time. Some say Japan is going through post-modernist era. Thus, Japan did not have enough time to have a complete transformation from the traditional era to modernity. This means that tradition and modernity coexist in Japanese society, where small shops and big markets have to fight for limited number of customers.

In conclusion, the survival of small shops in Japan is not only a problem of the owners but an inevitable clash of two different eras of civilization. Economic pressure of modern era has been pushing down the small shops. However, as long as Japan combines the traditional charm and the convenience of modernity, as it has been doing in many other fields, it would be able to find a way to combine both of the elements—the point where both big and small shops are not mutually exclusive.

My advice for small shop owners is that they cannot survive without making an effort. This does not mean blindly selling goods at cheaper price. Rather, it is to find a way to preserve the charm of tradition and keeping it intact. Then, the customers would find something more valuable and worthwhile than just a cheaper price at a supermarket.