Cooking up a Storm in Japan's Catering Industry! - Corporate Gourmet

Corrine SMITH, Owner of Corporate Gourmet

Let's be honest - the big question on most peoples' minds at seminars and official events - whether they like to admit it or not - is, "When is dinner being served?" Yes, dining at functions is always a pleasure, but what about the people behind the scenes who put the food on the tables and make it all happen?

In Tokyo, the person doing just that at the next function you attend could well be Australian entrepreneur Corrine SMITH, owner of Corporate Gourmet, a growing catering business specializing in corporate and social catering.

Since opening in March 2002, Corrine's business has catered for a whole host of different events for clients that have included embassies, foreign associations, chambers of commerce, PR agencies, production companies and modeling agencies. "I never expected I would do this before I came to Japan, but my parents started a multinational company and encouraged me to be independent and entrepreneurial, so it almost came naturally," she says.

Corrine first ventured to Japan in 1994 after completing a one-year course in Hospitality Management in Australia and decided it was time to travel. "I packed my bags and headed to Japan - for no particular reason, I just thought why not?" she recalls. On her arrival, Corrine immediately fell in love with the culture and way of life. "After six months I returned to Australia and completed a Bachelor of Commerce degree majoring in Marketing and Japanese." Through some fortunate connections, Corrine eventually returned to Japan, followed her passion into the food industry and established Corporate Gourmet.

"I was fortunate to have a good awareness of the opportunities available in this field," Corrine says about the preparation she undertook before entering the catering business. "However, there was significant work to be done in terms of meeting the necessary health and hygiene requirements and obtaining the correct licenses and certificates to operate here. A good lawyer and accountant proved invaluable," she says.

But the biggest hurdle was actually getting the business off the ground. "There are huge up-front costs when opening a commercial kitchen and I could not get a decent loan," she recalls. "It was such a 'catch-22' situation - we had to prove we were profitable in order for a bank to lend us money, but how could we prove that without being given the opportunity? I finally approached a restaurant with my idea and we set up a chef-share agreement & kitchen arrangement. This was not ideal but served us well for the first year in business and got us started."

Corrine has now built her business to the stage where it can run without her, thanks to her team of empowered staff. However, it has been difficult to reach that peak. "One of the hardest things in this business is training the event managers to be flexible," she says. "No two events are the same, so staff need to be able to adapt & cope with the different demands of clients."

One of her most hair-raising moments occurred when she parked her car full of catering food outside a client's premises, went inside, and when she came out the car had been towed away! "The car was full of food and the client was waiting," Corrine recalls. "I caught a taxi to the local Police station, paid the fine and luckily got my car -and all the food - back in the nick of time."

The major highlight to date was when Corrine's company catered an event for 1,000 guests in October 2004. "When the catering request came in we had never worked on an event of that size before - not even close - and it was such an accomplishment to do something on that scale," she recalls. "We received good feedback from the client. It proved that after a lot of hard work, organization and preparation, we are able to do anything. Since then we've also catered an event for 3,000 guests."

Dealing with Waste is a Major Problem
Facing a similar headache as many other food businesses, waste is a major problem for Corporate Gourmet. Shockingly, an estimated 6,000 tons of food is thrown away in Tokyo every day. "Initially when I started Corporate Gourmet, our main business line was our lunch delivery service," Corrine says. "We had contracts with many of the larger financial institutions, and delivery arrangements with hundreds of foreign and Japanese companies in Japan. However, after a year and some careful consideration, a decision was made to stop it and focus solely on catering. The problem with the lunch delivery service was the leftover food," Corrine says.

"As the meals were 'sold' not ordered, there always needed to be a surplus in order to give people choice and variety. This was such a waste of food (and revenue) and hence the reason we decided to stop. It was actually one of the best business decisions we have ever made - this gave us more time to focus on event management, it made a huge difference to our catering service and quality and certainly reduced the stress levels, that's for sure!"

What aspects of the business keep Corrine motivated? "The best thing about being in the catering business is that our clients are usually happy and positive, I mean we are talking about food and wine, it makes most people happy!" she says. "This is such a pleasure to face each day. Client satisfaction also keeps me motivated and the fact that we can be creative! Because each event has different requirements, it adds spontaneity to my day. I love seeing how we can make things bigger and better each time we cater an event," she says.

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