‘We have to change to survive’: Japanese bathhouses’ future in doubt amid plunge in customers

Although the Japanese government kept bathhouses open during the pandemic, the number of customers taking communal baths, long a tradition, is way down

The owner of one bathhouse, Takuya Shimbo, has plans to enhance it with craft beer and live music, hoping to point to a way of keeping the businesses going

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Takuya Shimbo, the third-generation owner of public bathhouse Daikoku-yu, cleans the floor before its daily opening amid the coronavirus disease pandemic in Tokyo. Photo: Reuters

Published: 5:15am, 1 Aug 2020Updated: 5:47pm, 2 Aug 2020

Craft beer, live music and lodgings featured in renovation plans that Takuya Shimbo had for an ageing Tokyo bathhouse, hoping to rescue a fading industry from extinction by reinventing the concept of communal bathing. Then the coronavirus struck.

The government deemed Japan’s few remaining bathhouses as critical for public hygiene so it requested they stay open, while at the same time encouraging people to stay at home during a state of emergency to prevent the spread of Covid-19.

“The costs, like staff and heating, don’t change, but we had far fewer customers,” said Shimbo, the 41-year-old, third-generation owner of Daikoku-yu in northeastern Tokyo.

The 60 per cent plunge in customer numbers, along with expenses for gutting and renovating another decrepit bathhouse in the neighbourhood, put him in a precarious shape. “We were operating in the red,” he added.

The coronavirus pandemic has badly affected Japanese bathhouse business. Photo: Kim Kyung-Hoon/Reuters

Bathing in naturally heated hot springs is a popular leisure activity in Japan. Public baths – or sento – on the other hand traditionally served people who did not have a bath at home. Divided into separate men’s and women’s sections, bathers scrub down before soaking together in hot tubs.