Quality Distributors launched a line of Japanese food products on June 7 supplied by Nishihara Shokai Co., a Japanese wholesaler headquartered in Kagoshima. Among the new products are frozen udon, soba and ramen noodles, yuba soymilk skin, seasoned jellyfish, fish cakes, root chips, bonito tataki, wasabi, soup bases, cakes and other desserts like warabi mochi.

“One of my goals is to be a one-stop shop, [so] I needed to bring in the additional Japanese foods. … Before now there was only one company that did Japanese food products, and the market needs competition to have good supply,” says George Lai, president of Quality Distributors. “Customers like to have more than one company to supply, to compare prices.”

Lai says he chose Nishihara Shokai as its supplier for the new Japanese product line as it is one of the largest wholesalers in Japan with more than 100,000 product offerings. Of the first container that arrived in the beginning of June, 60% was purchased within one week. Quality Distributors plans to bring in shipments every month.