41% of Japanese people hate particular vegetables and 60% of them fail to overcome their dislike. Adults especially find it difficult to overcome their dislike because they have hated the vegetable for such a long time. Once they try and fail, they never want to eat that vegetables again.

Furthermore, it was found that 78% of children will not eat the vegetables their parents dislike. During the COVID-19 pandemic, many of these adults are spending more time at home and eating more often with their families, which may be spreading their vegetable bias. By helping adults overcome hatred of vegetables, supermarkets can improve dietary awareness and benefit society.

"The World's Most Hated Restaurant" invites only hardcore vegetable-hating adults. Customers are only served dishes containing their hated vegetables to help them change.

There are three reasons for hating vegetables: bitterness, texture and smell. But various little-known preparation and cooking techniques can reduce these characteristics. With the help of a cooking researcher, Seiyu developed special dishes containing tomatoes, green peppers or eggplants, which are hated by many people.

Seiyu served these dishes at the restaurant and publicized the recipes of those that earned over 50% ratings – through online videos and recipe cards offered in the vegetable sections of Seiyu supermarkets throughout Japan. All recipes can be made in 15 minutes or less, creating opportunities for many vegetable haters to overcome their dislikes.

The Seiyu supermarket chain has 330 stores across Japan and has supported the well-being of Japanese by selling food for half a century. As a member of the Walmart Group, it is able to provide customers with products at low prices.

Adults who fail at least once to overcome dislike of a vegetable are unlikely to eat it again. Once they have children, 40% of them worry that their children will dislike the same vegetable, and a survey shows that 78% of their children refuse to eat it. Over 30% of adults do not serve their families the vegetables they dislike, and almost all vegetable haters have trouble figuring out how to overcome their dislike.

When targeting parents who want to overcome their dislike of vegetables, it became clear to Seiyu that providing information wasn’t enough. It had to provide a concrete solution.

First we discovered cooking methods that remove the unique bitterness, texture and smell of vegetables. Then we developed special recipes using these techniques. For example, the grassy smell of green peppers that many people dislike can be reduced by simply removing the white stripes that cause the smell.

"The World's Most Hated Restaurant", which invited only hardcore vegetable-haters, certified recipes that earned over 50% ratings of deliciousness from participants. The recipe development process and tasting event were also released in a video.

Certified recipes were publicized by posting videos on YouTube and other social networks, as well as by offering recipe cards at Seiyu supermarkets throughout Japan. A detailed chart was added showing how to cook and stop disliking tomatoes, green peppers, eggplants and other vegetables that many people hate.

The project became a hot topic in TV news programs, newspapers and online news sites, where it earned 152 million impressions in 244 related articles and over 83,016,618 yen (advertising conversion value). The tasting event movie also grabbed attention and was played over 4.5 million times.

Vegetable haters’ approval ratings were 54% and 89% for the two tomato dishes, 59% and 82% for the two eggplant dishes, and 63% and 46% for the two green pepper dishes. In the vegetable sections of Seiyu supermarkets, customers took over 500,000 recipe cards in the first month. Six food manufacturers, including Nissin Foods, Kagome and Maruha Nichiro, also supported the project by releasing unique recipes, which gave vegetable hating adults across Japan even more opportunities to change. As a result, Seiyu’s total vegetable sales rose 18.3%.