As local city centers continue to decline, events called "Shopping area activation: three sacred treasures (Bars, town seminars, and 100 yen shopping areas)" have begun to be held in central business districts throughout the country, and are receiving favorable reviews. These events differ from those intended to increase town visitors in that they lead visitors directly to each restaurant and aim to help establishments acquire new customers.
Our research focused on "Nagaoka Bar-Gai" which is an event that has been held in the area around Nagaoka station since 2012. We aimed to evaluate ticket use for this event quantitatively and to analyze its effectiveness as well as to highlight problems encountered by participants and participating restaurants based on a questionnaire survey. Our analysis of the nationwide "bar event" trend, and our investigation into the effects of and the problems faced by the "Nagaoka Bar-Gai" made the following points clear:
1. Bar events have spread rapidly throughout the whole country since 2011. While some areas faithfully follow the style of the original Hakodate west area bar event, others have chosen to change ticket fees. Also, some areas' objective is to activate the local economy, and others seem to be focused on promoting sales. We learned that there are various management styles for this type of event and they seem to be held periodically because their positive effects are recognized in many areas.
2. Many participants were able to happily explore the central area via the "Nagaoka Bar-Gai". More than 60 restaurants joined each time, and more than 6500 tickets were sold. The many visitors going from restaurant to restaurant map-in-hand on Bar-Gai day energized the central area.
3. Both participants and participating restaurant owners have shown a high degree of satisfaction with the event and have joined repeatedly. This may be because both owners and visitors simply enjoy the event and advertising their dishes or discovering new restaurants. Participating restaurants don't feel an immediate benefit, but often many repeat participants return to Bar-Gai participating restaurants in their daily lives after the Bar-Gai event. It can, therefore, be said that Bar-Gai also contributes to customer development, and that one of the event's aims, to guide customers directly to each restaurant, was achieved.
4. Participating restaurants mentioned various event management problems, but the linking of different restaurants in the area as a network under a common theme and ticket enabled the central area to be used like a theme park and was considered highly effective. Bar-Gai has successfully produced a new flow of people in the central area.
