A Look Into Starting A Business in Japan
Maritza De La Peña (Nara)
Transitioning from the JET Programme to founding a private English school, or eikaiwa, Jaclyn White demonstrates the necessary vision, the importance of community, and the challenges one might face when starting a business in Japan. After working as an ALT for five years, Jaclyn moved to a small city—Noshiro, Akita—where she founded Enplay.
English and Play
The name is a combination of the words “English” and “play.” “It’s about making English fun,” says Jaclyn. “I’m not here to make them fluent in English, I’m here to start their English journey. Because if they remember, when they were younger, that English was fun, we did a lot of fun games and Jaclyn-sensei was really cool, then they’ll want to learn English when they’re older.”
This model for learning English helps distinguish Jaclyn’s eikaiwa from others. In addition, as an American living in Japan and having worked with children in other countries, she uses her own experience to influence her English teaching.
“You don’t need to know anything perfectly with language, it’s all about communication and communication is language, but it’s also a bunch of other things as well,” she explains. It can be gestures, other body language, not saying the correct words and phrases but connecting the dots in between in order to be understood.
“I experience this every day in Japanese,” Jaclyn says. “So I think I could help kids get over that initial, ‘oh it’s not going to be perfect’. . . If I do figure it out with them and they see I figure it out, I think that gives them more confidence to speak and learn English.”
Connection and Communication
Jaclyn feels that a large part of her success thus far can be attributed to the community in Noshiro.
This includes her husband who helped connect her with other community members and resources. Additionally, she mentioned the local city hall, or shiyakusho, where she met someone contracted with the city who helps provide advice to those starting their own businesses. Through this free service, she was able to make an initial flyer and receive a lot of advice on how she should start and who she should talk to.
By meeting and connecting with other eikaiwa owners, Jaclyn was able to find an available building to run her business.Currently, she organizes events focused on intercultural learning together with another eikaiwa owner.
Other support that the city has provided includes continued advice and connections through workshops, as well as a grant that subsidizes half of Jaclyn’s rent for the next two years due to the eikaiwa being within a certain radius of the main train station.
Finally, when recruiting students, Jaclyn recommends reaching out to the local newspaper. More than half of her new students came from an article written about her first lesson at the school.
Ultimately, Jaclyn tries her best to help others in the community connect. “I don’t just do eikaiwa, I have my name out in a bunch of other things. I took over an English club at a cafe once a week. I went to a buddhist temple early on when I moved here and I talked to the monk and she likes to do a lot of events, so I started an English club. I also do an adult English night at Enplay—a speaking-and-mingling, two-hour event twice a month.”
It can take a while to build up credibility, so showing up, connecting with people, and putting yourself out there is key for building success.
First-Year Challenges
Any type of business is bound to have challenges, especially within the first year. For Jaclyn, a part of that is figuring out how to balance an ideal business model while still ensuring she is capable of making a living.
“I started this eikaiwa as a ticket system,” says Jaclyn. “I don’t think English should be a privilege. I think it should be available to whoever wants to learn this language. So, even if your family is busy, even if you can’t come every week, let’s start this English journey still. I have some students who only come twice a month or who are sick a lot, so they have to call out sometimes. If they pay monthly, their parents are wasting their money because they can’t come every week.”
Her solution is: instead of a monthly fee, parents can purchase a certain number of tickets to be used whenever the students are able to attend a lesson. However, this is not as profitable.
“In principle, I really like this idea of the ticket system. It’s not the kids’ fault [if they can’t come and] I don’t think they should be deprived of English fun. I’m still trying to balance what I should do in the future. This whole first year is a trial to see what I like and don’t like, so the ticket system is something I really have to consider,” she explains.
Parting Advice
When asked about giving advice, Jaclyn offered the following:
“First of all, thinking of the location of your eikaiwa is important. It’s important to research, find out how many eikaiwas there are in the area. I was lucky because there are no other native English-speaking eikaiwas here in Noshiro. It was a good market for me to have that start.”
Secondly, she highly advises to check the local town or city hall (yakuba or shiyakusho) for grants and other means of support. “At least in my small city, there’s an area you can go where you can talk to them and they have all the information about grants and events. They might even have an English speaker on staff there.”
Ultimately, having a community of people, family, or friends willing to help out is key to making the process of starting a business a lot easier.
“It’s all about meeting people in Japan,” she says. “Making those contacts is really important. You can’t do it yourself, you will need those contacts. Because someone will know someone who will know.”
Discover More
You can find out more about Enplay here.
AUTHOR BIO:
Maritza De La Peña currently lives in Nara Prefecture, where she often goes on walks to admire the archeological sites and rice fields near her home. You might also find her with a book in hand or excitedly staring out train windows.