Horiifoodservice Co.,Ltd.【JP:3077】Stock Price

Horii Food Service is a restaurant chain company that primarily operates Japanese-style dining restaurants. The company operates "Kakurekoan Shinobi-ya" as its flagship brand, running private-room-focused contemporary Japanese dining restaurants that provide customers with a refined, relaxing atmosphere.

The company's primary customers are individual consumers, and it operates under a typical restaurant industry business model that generates revenue from in-store dining services. Its locations are concentrated in the Kanto and Tohoku regions, with operations across three areas: the North Kanto region (Ibaraki, Tochigi, Gunma), the Greater Tokyo area (Tokyo, Saitama, Chiba, Kanagawa), and the Tohoku region (Fukushima, Miyagi, Yamagata).

The company operates multiple restaurant concepts, with approximately 80 locations in total, led by its flagship "Shinobi-ya" with 40 locations. While focusing on Japanese cuisine, the company also operates diverse dining concepts including Korean cuisine at "Chego!!", Italian at "Buongiorno Shokudo," ramen at "Ramen Fujita," as well as specialty restaurants such as "Hitachi no Kuni Mondokoro," which features local ingredients, and "Uma Kakoii," a beef tongue specialist restaurant.

Horii Food Service pursues sustainable growth under its founding principle of becoming "a comprehensive food service company where employees take pride in their work," amid the maturing restaurant industry. The company prioritizes EBITDA (operating profit before depreciation) at the store level and FLA values—the ratio of food costs, labor expenses, and advertising spending to sales—as key management metrics to optimize investment efficiency and store operations. To address industry-wide challenges of rising raw material costs and labor shortages, the company is optimizing costs through stronger reservation acquisition during peak hours and efficient staffing via revised operating hours.

The company's priority investment focuses on differentiation strategy centered on improving customer and employee satisfaction. It promotes higher QSC (Quality, Service, Cleanliness) standards and uses performance-linked incentive programs to boost employee motivation. On the product side, it develops original, safe, and reliable product lineups across business formats to meet diverse customer needs, and introduces timely signature items to drive store visits and sales growth. In human resources, it strengthens young employee development and supervisor-led store guidance systems through a "shared growth and learning" philosophy.

For new market development, the company is shifting from its previous dominant strategy centered on the North Kanto region to prioritizing expansion in the larger Tokyo metropolitan area. Following constraints on its flagship "Shinobi-ya" format during the pandemic, the company plans more diversified business expansion by developing formats that emphasize meal occasions and everyday use. After achieving certain improvements in existing store profitability through closures and format changes of underperforming locations, the company is now transitioning to a phase of business expansion through store network growth.

Regarding technological innovation, the company maintains fast-paced management through a simple and clear organizational structure while establishing management systems to support business expansion. It also prioritizes strengthening resilience against natural disasters and emerging infectious diseases, with ongoing consideration of operational restructuring, workforce securing, and financial planning. Through these initiatives, the company aims to build a sustainable corporate foundation even in the unstable operating environment of the restaurant industry.