Services with Care:

The Case of the Life Culture Platform “Hokuoh, Kurashi no douguten”

Abstract

In recent years, there has been a lot of discussion about care and it has been suggested that society should be structured around the idea of care. However, the question of whether a successful business can be structured around this idea of care has not been asked. In this study, we examined whether care-centered services or “services with care” can be established and succeed as a business through an exploratory case study of Kurashicom Inc., which operates “Hokuoh, Kurashi no douguten”. We found three characteristics of the case: (1) building a unique cultural asset, (2) hiring from customers, and (3) agile management, all of which can be explained by ethics of care, rather than ethics of justice. This case shows that businesses that follow ethics of care can be successful. The findings identify new research directions to explore with regard to design of a care-centered business.