Osaka, Japan-based sushi chain Kura Sushi is expanding its local fish project titled “Kura no Ippin,” aiming to implement the initiative in 530 of its restaurants nationwide by August 2023.
The initiative involves the use of locally-caught fish in limited-quantity specials on a weekly basis throughout each of Japan’s eight regions. The fish used in the project change depending on weekly catches so that customers can enjoy fresh, seasonal seafood specific to each region.
The project, facilitated through arrangements with local processors, is the first time a major sushi chain in Japan has extensively featured local, wild-caught fish on a regional basis.
“We hope that people will learn about the attractiveness of local fish again,” Kura Sushi Spokesperson Yuichiro Koyama said. “We hope this will help people to understand the appeal of local fish and boost the fishing industry in [each] region.”
Historically, it has been difficult for major conveyor-belt sushi chains to provide local fish because flexibly handling different species and sizes is challenging for the centralized processing plants they use. It was also difficult for them to secure sufficient quantities for nationwide sales, and many of their workers were unfamiliar with some of the fish and did not have the skills needed to cut it properly.
Kura started the “Wild Fish Project” initiative in 2010, but faced issues with it. Eventually, it upgraded its supply network to conduct direct transactions with 116 fishing ports and fishing cooperatives across Japan. The system focuses on offering typically underutilized species while allowing Kura to buy directly from the source, rather than through trading companies or other third-party entities.
Through Kura Sushi's system, fish landed at local fishing ports in each region undergo processing at 14 factories nationwide that serve as bases, which then, in turn, send the product to individual stores. Its location in Kaizuka Center in Osaka City has an associated brick-and-mortar shop that features local fish offerings, but Kura contracts with independent vendors to operate the other 13 stores.
Moving forward, the company plans to further subdivide the country from the current eight regions into 22 “blocks” to ensure its offerings are as local as possible. Each of the blocks will have its own “natural fish ecosystem,” in which Kura-designated plants process local seafood caught in the same region, and customers can enjoy the seafood at nearby sushi shops.
Long-term, Kura wants to increase the number of cooperating fishers and expand sourcing of local fish to include each of Japan’s 47 prefectures.
Some of the rare, wild-caught seafood dishes that Kura is offering include Sakhalin surf clams from the port of Tomakomai in Hokkaido and wild yellowtail from the Naruto Strait near Awaji Island. Other uncommon offerings include Hong Kong grouper and Japanese chicken grunt.
Deals include a plate of nigiri sushi for JPY 240 (USD 1.71, EUR 1.59) plus sales tax. Most plates contain two pieces of sushi, but more expensive items have only one. Since it comes in limited quantities, the offer ends as soon as the product runs out.
Sales change on a weekly basis, and the official LINE account – a popular messaging app in Japan – of each Kura Sushi store announces the menu the day before the sale.
Though most sushi chains occasionally run campaigns featuring local specialties, Kura intends for this initiative to be a permanent rotating, weekly offering. It's the latest effort from the chain to differentiate itself from its competition.
In the Sakana 100 Percent Project from 2018, Kura started turning fish trimmings waste into fishmeal and using it in aquaculture feed. The Wild Fish Education Project, started in 2019, raised juvenile bycatch fish to market weight in pens, and another Kura-run project found that scalpel sawtail (Prionurus scalprum, “nizadai” in Japanese), which picks up a distinctive odor from the seaweed that it eats, becomes palatable after eating cabbage in captivity for a certain period of time. The company then succeeded in commercializing it.
More recently, in 2021, Kura established Kura Osakana Farm as a subsidiary of Kura Sushi, focusing on the production and wholesaling of organic hamachi. It was the first in Japan to obtain certification as an organic marine product. Osakana Farm also employs automated feeding using artificial intelligence to reduce labor and improve the working environment.
Photo courtesy of Kura Sushi
