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Japan’s Kitchhike, Airbnb for home-cooked meals, gets $1.8M from Mistletoe, Mercari, others

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See the original story in Japanese. Tokyo-based Kitchhike announced on Tuesday that it has raised a total of 200 million yen (about $1.8 million US) from Mistletoe, Mercari, Venture United, in addition to a fund jointly run by Freebank and Tokyo TY Financial Group (TSE:7173). Financial terms have not been disclosed. The service initially started as a matching platform that connects cooking users and dining users in kitchens around the world. Launched back in May of 2013, it was slightly pivoted into a new concept in April of 2016 as a local community service allowing everyone to enjoy eating meals together. It has made a total of 10,000 matchmaking to date, bridging more than 1,000 matchmakings of cooks and diners each month.   Females in their 30s account for many of the service’s user base, and there’s also increasing cases that a user sometimes cooks meals for other users while also eating meals cooked by other users at other times. The company’s CEO Masaya Yamamoto told The Bridge that what’s common among users are they love eating and enjoy communicating with others. The company periodically hosts dinner parties at five locations in Tokyo, aiming to expand it into 500 locations…

Image credit: Kitchhike

See the original story in Japanese.

Tokyo-based Kitchhike announced on Tuesday that it has raised a total of 200 million yen (about $1.8 million US) from Mistletoe, Mercari, Venture United, in addition to a fund jointly run by Freebank and Tokyo TY Financial Group (TSE:7173). Financial terms have not been disclosed.

The service initially started as a matching platform that connects cooking users and dining users in kitchens around the world. Launched back in May of 2013, it was slightly pivoted into a new concept in April of 2016 as a local community service allowing everyone to enjoy eating meals together. It has made a total of 10,000 matchmaking to date, bridging more than 1,000 matchmakings of cooks and diners each month.

Image credit: Kitchhike

 

Females in their 30s account for many of the service’s user base, and there’s also increasing cases that a user sometimes cooks meals for other users while also eating meals cooked by other users at other times. The company’s CEO Masaya Yamamoto told The Bridge that what’s common among users are they love eating and enjoy communicating with others. The company periodically hosts dinner parties at five locations in Tokyo, aiming to expand it into 500 locations in the Tokyo Metropolitan Area.

After making a matchmaking between cooking users and dining users online, we assume that it will be a challenge for them who have never met before on a face-to-face basis to join a gathering.

Yamamoto explains:

You may think that sharing a dinner table with strangers is a new concept but it has been universally done for a very long time. We consider that such a culture should be matured in our service. Using the Internet, we’d like to reorganize the concept of meals to connect people with each others which was very common for mankind a long time ago.

Image credit: Kitchhike

The funds will be used to strengthen human resources for engineering, business development, and customer support. They will also focus on adding more features to their iOS and Android apps, expanding the aforementioned dinner party initiative, promoting growth marketing efforts. They aim to reach 100,000 monthly matchmakings in two years.

Regarding strategic partnerships with investors participating in this round, the company plans to work with Food and Farming Department at Mistletoe as well as collaborating with Mercari’s C2C marketplace app and the Mercari Atte classified service app, with aim to gain the quality of user experience and increase matchmaking opportunities.

Translated by Masaru Ikeda
Edited by “Tex” Pomeroy

Japan’s Kitchhike gives you alternative dining choices when you travel

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See the original story in Japanese. Kitchhike is a website that lets you experience meals prepared by locals (usually) in their home while you travel abroad. In a way, it is a sort of AirBnB for home-cooked meals. The service, which launches officially today, is a matching platform connects cooks and travelers in kitchens around the world. If you are interested in having local dishes when you travel, this site gives you a chance to dine on homemade dishes with local people instead of just visiting local restaurants. Currently it has 32 menus from six countries: Japan, Korea, mainland China, Thailand, Malaysia, and the Philippines. In online travel space, AirBnB focuses on finding accommodations, and Meetrip gives you a way to find a tour given by local people. Kitchhike’s proposed value is that it connects you with both local meals and local people, adding “delicious experiences” to your travel itinerary. This startup was founded by two entrepreneurs: Masaya Yamamoto, who previously worked at one of Japanese ad giant Hakuhodo DY Media Partners; and Syoken Fujisaki, who worked at Japanese thinktank Nomura Research Institute. Local people, local experiences In their announcement, they elaborate on what makes the service unique: Food culture is…

KitchHike_logo_betaSee the original story in Japanese.

Kitchhike is a website that lets you experience meals prepared by locals (usually) in their home while you travel abroad. In a way, it is a sort of AirBnB for home-cooked meals.

The service, which launches officially today, is a matching platform connects cooks and travelers in kitchens around the world. If you are interested in having local dishes when you travel, this site gives you a chance to dine on homemade dishes with local people instead of just visiting local restaurants. Currently it has 32 menus from six countries: Japan, Korea, mainland China, Thailand, Malaysia, and the Philippines.

In online travel space, AirBnB focuses on finding accommodations, and Meetrip gives you a way to find a tour given by local people. Kitchhike’s proposed value is that it connects you with both local meals and local people, adding “delicious experiences” to your travel itinerary.

This startup was founded by two entrepreneurs: Masaya Yamamoto, who previously worked at one of Japanese ad giant Hakuhodo DY Media Partners; and Syoken Fujisaki, who worked at Japanese thinktank Nomura Research Institute.

KitchHike_toppage

Local people, local experiences

In their announcement, they elaborate on what makes the service unique:

Food culture is not really created intentionally, but rather it is an accumulation, [intertwined with the] history of neighborhoods. Every single household has different meals, and these are the places that give you a real local feeling. For visitors, a meal served by local people might be one of the most exciting parts of encountering a new culture.

In addition to the usual sightseeing destinations, we believe that a table filled with homemade meals by local people is also a destination most people have never experienced.

Homemade meals becomes profitable

KitchHike_chatpage

Your homemade meals can take on a new value when you make them available to people outside your social circle. It’s not only globe trotters, but even your neighbors might be interested in experiencing your homemade meals.

For users who want to cook for someone (they are referred to as ‘cooks’ on the platform), you simply log on to the service and register what dishes you can prepare.

For users who want to eat dishes cooked by other users, you can choose a place (a cook’s residence) and contact them via the messaging feature. Subsequently they will schedule what time you can visit. To avoid any possible risk that might go along with meeting up with strangers, the service is linked up with Facebook for identification purposes.

The service is starting out in Asian regions, with some coverage in Europe and North America. But they are hoping for global expansion in the future.

KitchHike_co-founders