Brought to You By Japan, But Made in Mebane

Driving down Interstate 85 past Mebane, travelers pass a colorful HI-CHEW billboard that proudly proclaims, “Produced locally.”

That sign might be a confusing, dissonant sight in the middle of North Carolina, but Morinaga, the century-old Japanese company behind the beloved, hugely popular candy, has operated its only U.S. manufacturing facility here since 2015.

America’s growing appetite for the fruity, slightly sticky, seriously chewy candy prisms has fueled 20% year-over-year growth for the company’s U.S. division. The demand for HI-CHEW is so great that Morinaga cut the ribbon on a second, $136 million facility at the site on April 21.

The ceremony brought together local partners, North Carolina officials, including Gov. Josh Stein, and Morinaga employees and executives from as far away as California and Tokyo to celebrate the expansion. The ribbon-cutting was followed by a reception at the Washington Duke Inn in Durham that included barbecue, arcade games, and live caricature drawings. 

In a market already saturated with sweets, how did a Japanese candy become such a hit? Understanding its sudden success requires looking back to its origins.

Founder Taichiro Morinaga moved to the United States in the late 19th century at the age of 23, where he first discovered Western-style confections. He learned how to make chewy caramel and then took those techniques back home to pioneer a Western-style confectionery in Japan. He passed away in 1937, but his sweets’ popularity meant that the HI-CHEW story did not die with him.

Current Morinaga America President Terry Kawabe was born in Kyoto and fondly remembers picking up HI-CHEW on his way home from school. Back then, there were only three flavors: strawberry, green apple, and grapefruit. More than 200 flavors have since been produced, 50 of which are on the market today. 

After more than 30 years with the company, Kawabe’s enthusiasm remains as bright as ever. “I wanted to be part of the company that makes people smile,” he said in an interview with The Assembly. 

Kawabe joined Morinaga straight out of college, working in sales. At the time, he didn’t speak English, so he was mainly involved in imports. His career took a major turn in 2007, when he helped launch markets in Australia and New Zealand. He later worked in Indonesia, Thailand, Singapore, and South Africa before becoming the chief representative for Morinaga America in 2022.

Morinaga’s initial entry into the American market was in Hawaii, where HI-CHEW was popular in the Japanese community. The candy made its way to the mainland, first through Asian grocery stores and then spreading throughout the West Coast. 

The real breakthrough came when Morinaga switched from a Japanese distributor to an American candy distributor, landing HI-CHEW in mainstream retailers like Walmart, Target, and Kroger.

The Big Leagues

Until 2012, HI-CHEW was found primarily in the international aisles of grocery stores. Then, an unexpected and unofficial endorsement from Junichi Tazawa, a Japanese pitcher for the Boston Red Sox from 2009-16, changed the game. 

Tawaza introduced the candy to his teammates, and soon HI-CHEW was all over Major League Baseball. Fans of America’s pastime started to take note of what their idols were chewing, fueling further demand.

To capitalize on their growing popularity and continue their market expansion, Morinaga became a sponsor for the Red Sox, the Minnesota Twins, the Chicago Cubs, the Los Angeles Dodgers, the San Diego Padres, the Los Angeles Angels, the St. Louis Cardinals, and the Tampa Bay Rays. Huge ads appeared on ballpark screens, and company ambassadors passed out samples in stadium concourses. HI-CHEW has been spotted flowing freely out of yellow-branded buckets in the dugouts of teams across the nation. 

Morinaga’s U.S. corporate headquarters is in Irvine, California, but as HI-CHEW’s popularity grew, the company began exploring where it might build a U.S. manufacturing base. According to Kawabe, Mebane stood out for its space, infrastructure, available workforce, and supportive community. State and local incentives also played a role in the company’s decision.

The original facility that opened in 2015 now employs about 200. From the outside, the plant looks like any other: a plain, nondescript, gray industrial building with no indication of the colorful candies being made inside.

Morinaga says the expansion will add roughly 200 more jobs. The Orange County Board of Commissioners approved more than $2.9 million in tax incentives for the new facility in 2024 but projected it would net more than $4.5 million in taxes collected within the first 10 years.

Deputy Chief Operating Officer Yuji Kato moved his family from Los Angeles to North Carolina to oversee the project. Kato, originally from a rural town about an hour outside of Tokyo, had been working at Nissin Foods, a Japanese company best known for its instant noodles, for 17 years.  

He said he plans to use his experience at Nissin to improve systems and operations at Morinaga. “Nissin is more fully automated, speed speed, volume volume,” Kato said. “Here, there are more manual portions of it, so there are more conversations.”

Kato has known HI-CHEW and other Morinaga products since childhood and was especially fond of their small, crunchy chocolate sticks called Koeda. In his working-class family, sweets like Koeda were premium, special treats. At Morinaga headquarters, “I saw piles of the snacks on the table, I grabbed one box, and I finished it in five minutes.” 

He said his wife also appreciates the new job. The noodle factory had a “deep fried, oily smell,” he explained, with some seasoning, chicken, and beef thrown in. “Here, once you step in, it’s sweet. Right away, you smell it,” Kato said. “My wife won’t say, ‘Oh, you smell like chicken soup,’ anymore.”

Something Unconventional

Production operator Arthur Funchess had never heard of Morinaga or HI-CHEW until he attended the GalaxyCon convention in Raleigh in 2018 and stumbled upon Morinaga recruiters. “I noticed it was right around the corner from my house, and right after then I put in my application, and I got right in,” Funchess said. 

In his first position, he operated the kneading machine, but now he works across operational functions, which gives him insight into all the steps involved in production. “You make sure everything that you’re putting in is the exact weight, the exact flavor, the exact color.” 

Once Morinaga established its U.S. base, the company turned its attention to American tastes. In Japan, customers tend to prefer fruit flavors and are attuned to subtle distinctions, down to the nuanced differences between regional apple varieties, like Shinshu, Aomori, Tohoku, and Fuji. As a point of comparison, Kawabe notes it would seem absurd to sell both a Florida orange and a California orange flavor in the U.S. 

Here, consumers tend to crave bold and novel flavors. The popular Fantasy Mix (blue raspberry, rainbow sherbet, and Blue Hawaii) and Getaway Mix (mango chamoy, mai tai, and yuzu lime) are both exclusive to the U.S. market.

“American people are always looking for something unique and unconventional beyond the fruit,” he said. 

The new factory will enable the production of an additional 1.2 billion HI-CHEWs annually. It will also allow Morinaga to branch out into new retail channels such as dollar stores and club stores, the company said, and open the door for more seasonal offerings. 

“We’re proud to continue investing in the Mebane community,” Kawabe proclaimed at the ribbon-cutting ceremony, “and work together to create a future filled with more fun, flavorful HI-CHEW moments.”