ABC-Mart, one of Japan's largest sellers of shoes, is pushing deeper into Southeast Asia as it tries to turn a strong domestic business into a genuinely international one. The retailer, which runs roughly 1,500 stores in Japan and abroad, wants a much bigger slice of its revenue to come from outside its home market, and it sees the region's young, spending minded consumers as the way to get there.
The ambition is clear in the numbers the company is targeting. Overseas sales currently account for around 30 percent of the total, and management wants to lift that to roughly half. To hit that mark, ABC-Mart is leaning on markets across Southeast Asia while continuing to invest in its established overseas strongholds of South Korea and Taiwan, where most of its nearly 400 foreign stores are located.
A new leader with a growth mandate
Driving the plan is Kiichiro Hattori, the recently installed president, who has been given a mandate to speed up the company's expansion abroad. Under his watch, the retailer is treating Southeast Asia less as a side project and more as the next major stage of its growth, a shift for a business long anchored in a mature and slowly shrinking Japanese market.
ABC-Mart is not starting from scratch in the region. It opened its first Southeast Asian store in Vietnam in 2022, and in 2025 it entered the Philippines, unveiling a flagship in the Bonifacio Global City district of Manila through a joint venture with a local retail partner. Thailand and Indonesia are now firmly on its radar as it looks for the next markets to enter.
Shelves stocked with global names
Part of the appeal for shoppers is the brand lineup. ABC-Mart's stores stock a wide range of sneakers, sandals and apparel from the biggest names in the business, including Nike, Adidas, Puma, Asics and New Balance, alongside limited edition releases that draw sneaker enthusiasts. Its Manila flagship alone carries more than a thousand products, positioning the chain as a one stop destination for footwear in the malls where Southeast Asians increasingly shop.
The strategy is deliberately measured. The company plans to open around five stores in the current financial year, with cities such as Cebu and Davao in the Philippines under consideration, suggesting a careful, market by market rollout rather than a rush to plant flags everywhere at once.
Why the region matters
The logic behind the push is straightforward. Japan's population is aging and its consumer market is stagnant, which caps how much a retailer can grow at home. Southeast Asia offers the opposite, a large and youthful population, rising incomes and a growing appetite for branded goods, all concentrated in the shopping malls that anchor city life across the region.
For ABC-Mart, planting stores in those malls now is a bet that today's aspirational shoppers will become tomorrow's loyal customers. If the expansion works, a company built on selling shoes in Japan could end up making as much money abroad as it does at home, turning a domestic champion into a regional force in Asian retail.
