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Overtourism in Japan, and how it hurts small businesses

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Re: Overtourism in Japan, and how it hurts small businesses

#71

Post by franciscop »

tanjtanjtanj wrote: post #36
wichert wrote: post #18

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Vending machines outside is pretty much the standard for ramen restaurants. Most of them will take passmo/suica, which most foreigners are also likely to have since it is also used for all public transport.

I’ve been to this restaurant. They take cash as payment so I don’t think they are trying to dissuade tourists. Also, just a short few years ago I would say less than 10% of restaurants took any form of electronic payment.

I've been 10 years on-and-off, and 10% sound way too low _if we include_ Suica/Pasmo. Credit card is another story and I'd agree.

Re: Overtourism in Japan, and how it hurts small businesses

#72

Post by amluto »

timr wrote: post #57
paulgerhardt wrote: post #14

Missed opportunity to talk about the locals creative responses to this. One cafe in Tokyo is asking customers to leave negative reviews on Google and Trip Advisor to prevent over exposure (it mostly works but made me curious enough to visit). Another specific $10 Michelin guide ramen restaurant only lets you order from a vending machine outside using a payment method you can’t access as a foreigner (one needs a physi…

I don't know about the Ramen place (I can't believe that they wouldn't take cash?), but I agree with you that more places are doing this kind of "two markets" stuff -- it's even becoming official, in that now there's officially sanctioned "foreigner pricing" for certain temples, shrines, and parks. There's also Google Maps and Yelp vs. Japan's local version (pretty much any review on the former two are useless, and h…

> I really miss the days when it was possible to be welcomed pretty much anywhere as a foreigner and have almost universal expectations of high quality, scam-free experiences

How long ago was that? It was certainly true in fairly large portions of the world, but there are plenty of places where, for as long as I can remember, you could pretty much expect to be scammed regularly. In many cases those scams would be for trivial (to visitors from wealthy countries) amounts of money, but it nonetheless often seemed like a large fraction of local economies would be driven by scamming tourists.

I think that the real recent change is that the “beaten path” of touristy areas has gotten larger.

Re: Overtourism in Japan, and how it hurts small businesses

#73

Post by dagw »

WangComputers wrote: post #43
paulgerhardt wrote: post #14

Missed opportunity to talk about the locals creative responses to this. One cafe in Tokyo is asking customers to leave negative reviews on Google and Trip Advisor to prevent over exposure (it mostly works but made me curious enough to visit). Another specific $10 Michelin guide ramen restaurant only lets you order from a vending machine outside using a payment method you can’t access as a foreigner (one needs a physi…

"they’re serious about “no entry” if you have tattoos" That's nothing unusual in Japan, even Japanese people in Japan can't join a gym or get car insurance if they've got tattoos. They're serious about that stuff for a reason.

It's fairly unusual to strictly enforce it on foreigners. Every place I've been with a no tattoos policy generally overlook tourists with smaller unassuming tattoos.

Re: Overtourism in Japan, and how it hurts small businesses

#75

Post by mrln »

NalNezumi wrote: post #25
paulgerhardt wrote: post #14

Missed opportunity to talk about the locals creative responses to this. One cafe in Tokyo is asking customers to leave negative reviews on Google and Trip Advisor to prevent over exposure (it mostly works but made me curious enough to visit). Another specific $10 Michelin guide ramen restaurant only lets you order from a vending machine outside using a payment method you can’t access as a foreigner (one needs a physi…

https://www.reddit.com/r/funnysigns/comments/1getgra/a_resta... Edit: The red text at the bottom says: この日本語が読める方は、 ご入店くださいませ = "if you can read this Japanese text, please come in" Edit 2: just the original reddit post link then

The link is dead

Re: Overtourism in Japan, and how it hurts small businesses

#76

Post by cma256 »

skeezyboy wrote: post #64
NalNezumi wrote: post #21

The problem isn't small businesses. Japan already have millions of hard to find gems that even the locals don't know, because the owners barely market things (runs on local patronage) and those are still doing fine outside the tourism craze. And those places can be quite direct about not wanting the one-off tourist; When I was an exchange student in Kyoto we were told off from a couple of places, which wasn't an issu…

[flagged]

Not very kitsch of the participants in those atrocities. I'm not sure what that has to do with people alive today.

Re: Overtourism in Japan, and how it hurts small businesses

#77

Post by diggan »

VWWHFSfQ wrote: post #70
bryanlarsen wrote: post #27

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> And a few more of the seedier bars just have a “no foreigners” sign out front. Those have existed long before tourism to Japan became common. Those signs were there when the vast majority of foreigners in Japan were English teachers and soldiers. Many tabehodai (all-you-can-eat) and most nomihodai (all-you-can-drink) places had them.

> no foreigners It's such a contrast to USA, where I doubt that such a thing would even be legal. And also the bit about no tattoos. That's lawsuit city.

> That's lawsuit city

Aren't private businesses in the US allowed to deny access to their premises for any reasons? Seems like a weird thing to get sued over, I think in most places if you own the local, you get to decide who goes there, unless it's a place for government or similar.

Re: Overtourism in Japan, and how it hurts small businesses

#79

Post by esperent »

timr wrote: post #57
paulgerhardt wrote: post #14

Missed opportunity to talk about the locals creative responses to this. One cafe in Tokyo is asking customers to leave negative reviews on Google and Trip Advisor to prevent over exposure (it mostly works but made me curious enough to visit). Another specific $10 Michelin guide ramen restaurant only lets you order from a vending machine outside using a payment method you can’t access as a foreigner (one needs a physi…

I don't know about the Ramen place (I can't believe that they wouldn't take cash?), but I agree with you that more places are doing this kind of "two markets" stuff -- it's even becoming official, in that now there's officially sanctioned "foreigner pricing" for certain temples, shrines, and parks. There's also Google Maps and Yelp vs. Japan's local version (pretty much any review on the former two are useless, and h…

> it still requires advance planning for a place that used to be a casual, walk-in experience

So, much like every restaurant that becomes popular, anywhere in the world?

Re: Overtourism in Japan, and how it hurts small businesses

#80

Post by bryanlarsen »

ragazzina wrote: post #60
bryanlarsen wrote: post #23

Tourism in Japan is still pretty low compared to traditional tourism hot spots like Paris or Rome. As is usual, it's the relative change that is significant rather than the absolute numbers. The change from "almost none" to "some" affects a place more than the change from "a lot" to "even more".

> Tourism in Japan is still pretty low compared to traditional tourism hot spots like Paris or Rome. Tokyo has more international tourists than Rome and is the third city destination in the world. https://www.euromonitor.com/press/press-releases/december-20...

That's a list of where people want to go. Further down in the article is the list of cities where people actually go. Tokyo isn't in the top 10.
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