KANEKO OPTICAL: its work and people

Building human relationships is not an easy thing. If possible, we want to be honest with ourselves and honest with others. But insisting on that goal can lead to negative reactions and awkward moments. So most of the time we try to preserve peace and balance in human relationships by holding back what we want to say or choosing not to think too deeply even about things that don't make sense. Staff member Momoko Kutsutani at the Kaneko Optical Grand Front Osaka store is in her 16th year with the company. “A hard worker,” a “strong willed woman with a professional attitude,” an “uncompromising pro,” “serious,” “loves to help people,” “listens seriously to advice,” –

Kutsutani was born and raised in Kyoto. After high school she hoped to attend piano tuning school to become a piano tuner. People around her strongly disagreed, however, and told her “to think carefully about work with more future.” She ended up graduating without any path decided, facing early confusion in her life plans. She took a job for the moment working at a plastic surgeon’s clinic, but couldn’t let go of her thoughts of piano tuning school, and after a year and half she left that job, passing through several part time jobs with the intention to save up for school. But as she lived this life, her original goal seemed to fade, and she felt at a loss for what to do next. In the midst of all this, she encountered the world of eyewear.
“I’d worn glasses since I was in elementary school. There was a time when I changed to contact lenses, but I hurt an eye in an accident at high school so I could no longer use contacts. This was what spurred me to buy for the first time my own eyeglasses with the money I’d saved up from part-time jobs. Compared to the kids around me, I wasn’t stylish or anything – more on the understated side. But when I started wearing those glasses with the cell

After quitting, Kutsutani spent a year resting, then resumed her search for work. On a job search site she clicked on Kaneko Optical. “The store where I worked in my last job promoted itself pretty loudly in the Kansai area, and it was a small world, so I’ll be honest that I hesitated about going back into the eyewear industry. But during that year I’d taken off, I’d been more or less cut off from the outside world, and I didn’t have a place to be. I was applying more because I wanted to restore my connection to the outside world than because I wanted to get a job or a return to the eyewear industry” (laughs). At the time, Kaneko Optical was looking for starting staff to work at the “COMPLEX+ Kyoto Store” (the current Kaneko Optical Kyoto store) then about to open. Kutsutani’s was interviewed by President Shinya Kaneko himself. Kutsutani still remembers the moment when, as the interview was winding down, Kaneko asked her gleefully, “you really do love glasses, don’t you?” She was hired, and relieved for the moment that she had found a place to be. 

When she joined Kaneko and started working as a salesperson in the store, Kutsutani realized her strength was in the many “drawers” she could open in conversations with customers. She had a high interest in cultural and intellectual subjects, and customers found her easy to approach through conversations even about private matters. Over the years she gained many long-term customers from both Japan and abroad. “I think time with customers is in some sense an opportunity to connect with their personalities. As I ask about how they use eyewear, I get to know their tastes and preferences, and the conversations often take off in directions that have nothing to do with the products themselves. I might buy and read a book recommended by a customer, or actually go to a local restaurant they liked, or do my best to access the things or places they’ve told me about, so I can talk about my reactions when they come back to the store for an adjustment. I think in this way I’ve gradually grown my relationships with customers who might not remember my name but know my face.” One area where her “uncompromising nature” is manifested is in eyeglass fitting. Kutsutani herself knows the importance of that process better than anyone. “I think every job is important, but the technique of fitting is especially so. 

“I think that all of my work is important, but I place particular importance on coordination skills. “I think every job is important, but the technique of fitting is especially so. People pointed out my lack of a full grasp of fitting for years after I joined the company. My boss repeatedly asked me, “are you really looking deeply?,” and I began to see that my visual resolution was probably pretty low as I went about the work of fitting.” From that point on she understood the immaturity of her technique, which she kept polishing through practice and feedback. Her strong instincts for “what I want to do,” and “this is how it should be done” led her to master refined fitting, to the point that many customers visiting the store for a fitting now check first that Kutsutani will be on shift.
On the other hand, Kutsutani’s “strongly uncompromising” nature – a strength when interacting with customers or doing fittings, sometimes meant she was so concentrated that she couldn’t see the store operation as a whole. “When I was still a young staff, it was all I could do to handle the work in front of me – sales, customer interactions, and so forth. Now that I have junior staff and I’m in a higher position, I’m made aware of many things as I look back at my work in the past.”
Clumsy but straightforward, honest, uncompromising. 15 years have passed since she joined the company. Now in a middle management position, she communicates and trains younger staff every day, reflecting the many experiences she’s accumulated of hitting walls and finding ways to overcome them. Kutsutani keeps questioning herself and finding answers, with a will to improve every day on the job. 

She feels a deep resonance with one of Kaneko Optical’s tenets: “to contribute through eyewear to improving the cultural life of people.” She wants to be not only the bridge that helps customers finally find the ideal eyewear they’ve been seeking, but for those people’s lives to become more comfortable, more optimistic, and happier through the eyewear she proposes. The more a pair of glasses can improve their lives, the more she feels it: “I’m so glad I’m doing this work.”


PROFILE

Momoko Kutsutani

Born and raised in Kyoto. Started out in a clerical job at a local orthopedic clinic. Later moved to a job in sales at an eyeglass specialty shop with outlets in Kansai. After about three years there, took off a year to recharge, then joined Kaneko Optical. After being assigned to the COMPLEX + Kyoto Store (the current Kyoto store of Kaneko Optical), moved through positions around the Kansai