Small Business
You Can Rent a Dad in Japan
Ryuichi Ichinokawa’s Heart Project can help if you don’t have a date to a family reunion or the relations to fill a proper wedding.
Ichinokawa, 52, who’s often hired to act as a father, needs to keep a low profile; he founded the Heart Project in Tokyo in 2006.
Photographer: Ko-Ta Shouji for Bloomberg BusinessweekThis article is for subscribers only.
Ryuichi Ichinokawa: We don’t want clients to use our service as an emotional crutch. We won’t take any illegal requests. Parent stand-ins are the most expensive: 30,000 yen ($275) per person. To attend a wedding is 15,000 yen per person; giving a speech is 5,000 yen.
About 20 percent to 30 percent of the jobs are for weddings. The next big one is a stand-in for parents and introducing parents to a prospective spouse; that’s another 30 percent to 40 percent. Clients are typically in their 20s to 40s. I take every job with the understanding that we are only doing it once.