AWAJI, Japan — Pushing her stroller chair with steely determination, Sueko Inoue, 83, cut across the parking lot of the Lawson convenience store here one recent morning and homed in on the entrance.
After the automatic doors let her in, she quickly grabbed two rice balls and put in an order for a stew called oden and a cafe latte. Inoue then settled back at one of the four tables, waiting to see what the day would bring at the convenience store where everybody knows her name.
"This store's for the elderly," said Inoue, who, even if the years had not bent her back, would not have stood much taller than the umbrella affixed to her stroller. "The day before yesterday, I was here from 6 in the evening to midnight."
Since convenience stores were introduced to Japan from the United States three decades ago, they have largely served a youthful clientele, specifically men in their 20s and 30s who spend an average of three minutes in a store, while youngsters often idle out front. But in a sign of Japan's rapidly graying society, these stores associated with the young are being transformed to cater to the elderly.
Inoue has become a die-hard regular since this store in western Japan became the first in the Lawson chain to make the shift last month. Aisles were widened to accommodate wheelchairs, shelves were lowered by 6 inches for easier reach, price tags were enlarged and tables were added for lingering.
Lawson, the nation's second-largest convenience store chain, with nearly 8,400 stores, is scheduled to change 11 of them into senior-friendly stores by the end of the year. But eventually, Lawson expects to transform 20 percent of its stores, or nearly 1,700, into elderly oriented stores.
With Japan now leading the world in aging — 21 percent of all Japanese are over 65 years old, and the overall population started declining last year for the first time since World War II — Japanese companies, both low- and high-tech, are increasingly shifting their attention to older people. Researchers are developing robots that can serve as companions for the lonely elderly, carry them up stairs or act as bionic suits for enfeebled legs.
Last year, Watami, a chain of Japanese-style taverns popular among the young, also went into the business of running nursing homes. At 19 such homes, the company specializes in preparing easily digested meals for the aging: On a piece of tuna sushi, for example, the tuna is minced, then reshaped to make it look as if it were whole.
Businesses are scrambling to adapt themselves to changing demographics because Japan's population aged rapidly over a short period, said Hiroyuki Murata, an expert on aging and business in Tokyo. In 1990, Japan had the same percentage of those over 65, a little over 12 percent, as the United States did. Today, while the rate has changed little in the U.S., decreasing childbirth rates, longer life expectancy and no immigration have pushed up Japan's rate.
"The change was sudden," Murata said. "That's why the infrastructure and services haven't caught up yet."
The convenience stores, with 40,000 nationwide, have become a symbol of the hurried modern life in Japan, places where customers can buy their meals in neat packages, pay their utility bills, withdraw money from an ATM or send parcels, 24 hours a day, 365 days a year. But demand for such efficiency has decreased with the aging population that convenience store chains are beginning to court.
"We're feeling a sense of crisis," Kazuo Kimura, a spokesman for Lawson, said, adding that sales had declined in the past two years. "Because of the aging and declining population, if we keep on doing business as usual, it's doubtful that we'll see an upturn in sales."
The strategy will focus on rural areas with large concentrations of the elderly, like this city, where 29 percent of the residents are over 65. Awaji, the epicenter of the 1995 earthquake that devastated nearby Kobe, is a relaxed city with green mountains and palm trees, on an island in Japan's Inland Sea.
"Before, an elderly man telephoned to ask how late Lawson was open and what day we were closed," said Minoru Nagano, 57, the owner of the chain's store here. "There's always been a perception that convenience stores were for young people. Now that's starting to change."
Nagano's store now has wheelchair-accessible toilets. Instead of Lawson's trademark sharp blue, the store's facade has been repainted a soft brown. The shelves are stocked with health magazines, instant meals that can be consumed without chewing and fresh vegetables — a single carrot or a quarter of a napa cabbage. There are also batteries for hearing aids. At the checkout counter, shoppers can rest their canes on one of two cane holders.
Nagano said sales had risen sharply since the renovation.
At another newly renovated Lawson, near Yonago in Tottori prefecture, the owner, Mie Noguchi, 43, said her store's sales had also increased. Her store now sells locally produced vegetables and sake, while cutting back on the variety of juices and cafe latte.
Automatic doors were installed, so that older shoppers no longer feel that they are imposing on the store's employees.
One customer, Yoshie Kobayakawa, 72, said she appreciated the changes, including the wider aisles and easier-to-read price tags.
"When you get older," Kobayakawa said, "somehow you end up buying an item you thought cost 300 yen when it was actually 800 yen."