Things are only getting worse, it seems, for major Japanese restaurant chain Sukiya. After admitting that a customer got a mouse in a bowl of soup, it’s now temporarily closing a number of other stores as it discovers systemic hygiene issues.
The 24-hour beef bowl specialty chain, owned by Zensho Holdings Corporation, has once again updated its website to announce that an insect was found in food given to a customer at the company’s Akishima Station South Exit store in Akishima City, Tokyo. The chain says it learned of the incident after a customer called to complain on March 28th.
While the announcement isn’t identifying the insect in question, multiple media reports claim it was a cockroach.
As a result, the chain said, it’s temporarily closing most stores from 9am on March 31st until 9am on April 4th. The closure excludes certain stores in shared spaces that Sukiya doesn’t directly own or rent, such as shopping centers.
The news has come as a shock to X user Manarisu, who’s made a name for himself by eating at Sukiya at least once every day for 2,000 consecutive days as of March 20th, 2025. He’s asking his 149,000 followers to help him identify local Sukiyas in food courts so he can keep the streak going. The keyword マナリス 餓死 (“Manarisu starvation”) is becoming a popular search term in the wake of the tragic news.
The mouse investigation continues
Sukiya’s fortunes have been sinking ever since the company revealed on March 21st that a customer had been served a dead mouse in a bowl of miso soup two months earlier. Despite closing the store and obtaining a health department clearance to re-open, the chain remained publicly silent about the issue for months. It only made a statement after the incident went viral on social media.
As a result, Zensho Holdings Corp.’s stock took a sudden dip on the Tokyo Stock Exchange, losing 7.1% of its value in a day. It’s since restored some of the losses and is still trading well above its lowest point in the past year. (That could change come Monday.)
Zensho is still trying to provide an adequate explanation for how an entire mouse carcass ended up in a bowl of miso soup. In its latest public statements before the cockroach incident, the company said it believes the rodent entered a fissure in the rubber seal of a refrigerator that faces both inside and outside.
The company insists there’s no evidence the mouse was cooked – i.e., that it actually came from a communal vessel holding food served to numerous customers.
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