$25 Ski-Slope Ramen Is a Glimpse of Japan’s Future
Deep-pocketed tourists are boosting prices, and wages, in some of the country’s prestige ski resorts. That carries both opportunities and risks.
A skier at Niseko Tokyu Grand Hirafu ski resort in Kutchan, Hokkaido Prefecture, Japan.
Photographer: Bloomberg/Bloomberg (2023)
Japan has been trying to create a “virtuous cycle” of price and wage increases for over a decade. But there are perhaps only a few places where it has succeeded: Once-sleepy skiing towns where the local economy is dominated by deep-pocketed foreign spending.
In Hokkaido’s Niseko, famous among tourists for its unrivaled powder snow, regular Japanese dishes are going for faintly outrageous prices: ¥3,500 ($23) for a bowl of tempura soba from a food truck, easily more than three times what one would pay at a sit-down joint in Tokyo; ¥3,200 for the ski-resort staple of katsu curry; ¥3,800 for crab ramen.