Food Chain - Issue 207 - August 2025 | Page 28

Cover Story _______________________________________________________________________________________________________
for example, you’ ll find American-style sushi with brown or purple rice, mayonnaise, and crunchy onions on the top, whereas Mai Sushi is very colorful with small, pretty garnishes. Driving a positive food culture resulted in us winning recognition for our quality at the Quality Food Awards eight years in a row. We won the Great Product Award and the Great Taste Award, as well as landing Golden Q’ s Product of the Year out of thousands of entries.
“ We have a team of fabulous chefs, most of whom have been with us since the very beginning, and we operate our own development kitchen to work on new recipes and conduct product tastings,” Jason continues.“ We taste new products almost weekly, as while the classic products will always sell, it’ s great to bring some innovation to the sushi market to attract people to our kiosks. In fact, some of the most successful launches we’ ve done have been in partnership with cause related marketing where a percentage of the revenue is donated to charity, such as the Fisherman’ s Mission or Trees for Cities.”
Strategic relationships
With quality being one of Hana’ s top priorities, the company works closely with its supply chain to protect its standards.“ We approach supplier relationships as true collaborative partnerships rather than as a buyer and supplier,” Jason explains.“ These strategic relationships are not only powerful from a supply perspective, but they also help us advance our sustainability agenda. While we love accreditations like ASC or MSC because they provide assurance to the wider market, we also visit suppliers ourselves. We’ ve visited our salmon farms, for example, and spent time meeting fishermen and
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