Huat Zai

In Japan they apologize, in Singapore, they will fire all the locals, hire cheap foreign workers, and cut the size of the whole thing by half.

A F&B store owner in Japan received floods of customers after a sincere apology he posted on social media went viral. The man, Junya Hashimoto, is the owner of Taiyaki no Bunfukuya in Gyoda City, Saitama Prefecture. The store specialises in taiyaki, a traditional Japanese fish-shaped pastry which is typically filled with red bean paste. Too much filling According to SoraNews, 45-year-old Hashimoto started seeing a lull in business during the summer months, as the steaming taiyaki treats are typically best enjoyed during winter. Combined with stringent restrictions brought about by the Covid-19 pandemic, sales at Taiyaki no Bunfukuya apparently dropped by around 70 per cent. As such, Hashimoto decided to raise the prices of his taiyaki, but felt bad, and subsequently started adding more red bean filling to compensate for the price hike. Little by little, he apparently started adding so much filling that he realised he was making an even greater loss and that his store would go bankrupt soon, reported SoraNews. This left him with no other option but to reduce the amount of red bean paste in his taiyaki. The decision made Hashimoto feel so guilty that he decided to come clean about it on Twitter. Here's his tweet of a handwritten sign plastered outside his store, which states: "Honestly speaking, I used to put a lot of anko (red bean paste) inside, but there was no profit from it. I will reduce the amount of anko because the store is about to go broke. Please forgive me." Honesty is the best policy Hashimoto's heartfelt apology and plea for forgiveness struck a chord with netizens, and his tweet has since received over 27,400 retweets since it was posted on Aug. 24. Twitter users praised his honesty, with some others adding that Hashimoto's taiyaki is still delicious even with lesser filling. Some also promised that they would visit the store. His viral tweet also got him on the news, and several customers were seen queueing outside the tiny shop. https://mothership.sg/2021/09/japan-taiyaki-store-apologise/