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Longtime Little Tokyo Shops Are Reinventing Themselves To Survive
Mochi maker Bill Kito says the family business Fugetsu-Do has survived 100-plus years in Little Tokyo, even making it through World War II, when his dad was incarcerated with other Japanese Americans at a camp in Wyoming.
But the kind of threat COVID-19 poses has got to make it "the worst," he says — because under the state's stay-at-home order, dine-in regulars can no longer stroll in off the street.
Across Little Tokyo's five city blocks, longtime small businesses like Fugetsu-Do are being forced to change decades-old ways of operation. They're cutting their menus for take-out orders, sprucing up their social media presence and creating deals to entice new customers.
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