ABSTRACT
This chapter suggests that some of the Japanese services can claim high prices due to the cultural experience they offer. It presents a case study on sushi bars in Tokyo. The chapter examines the social relationship between service providers and customers. It shows that service providers and customers are defining and negotiating themselves and others through service interactions. Service providers try to present a certain representation of the culture. Looking back at history, the traditional meaning of culture was a critique of the capitalist material society or, to put it simply, the society of businesses. Now the concept of culture needs to be internalized within the business. Even when integrated within business, the concept of culture remains critical in that it always paints something other than the existing social order. It is precisely this displacement of capitalist society by culture that is now the source of value in the business realm.
