Today we’d like to introduce you to Nagi C
Hi Nagi, so excited to have you with us today. What can you tell us about your story?
The story of the First Permanent Maid Cafe in California
My first experience with maid cafes started when I was just starting to get into cosplay. Being an avid fan of pop-culture and especially Japanese animation, I found myself relating to many of the characters and collecting figurines, outfits, and collectables.
One day my best friend invited me to join them at a local anime convention in Houston, Texas. At first I was a little reluctant, but I soon agreed and purchased tickets to check it out. But before attending, I visited their website and found that At Home Cafe (a popular Akihabara maid cafe in Tokyo, Japan) was participating. I found myself researching maid cafes online and on YouTube and was delighted to see such a fun and rewarding subculture.
I quickly applied as a maid staff and met Hitomi who was the head maid of At Home Cafe, and other At Home Cafe staff who welcomed me. I was even provided with the official uniform which was the highlight of my experience.
I had a great time at the At Home Cafe pop-up in Anime Matsuri, and felt a little sad when the experience ended (con goers would know this as, “post-con depression”). So I searched for other maid cafe pop-ups in the United States, and found an active and cute one in California named Arcane Maid Cafe.
Coincidentally, I had plans to attend university in California and they were having a popup in Torrance, CA. I visited their website, applied, and soon received an email to participate. A short flight to Los Angeles, and a photoshoot later, I was already starting my next story in maid cafe experiences.
I had a wonderful time at Arcane Maid Cafes pop-up event, and was once again left with the mundane daily routine of school, work, and going home. I felt that I needed to take the initiative and help the maid cafe I was a part of to achieve greater and bigger things, so I took the opportunity to take on bigger responsibilities.
I soon rose in the ranks of the maid cafe: From a trail maid, to Kouhai maid, to Senpai Maid, and finally to a senior position, and eventually becoming head maid. I took charge in the overall cafe’s theme, menu design, and food and drink offerings.
Our maid cafe became a recurring vendor and exhibitor in many Anime conventions throughout the United States. Each week, we would have new staff applications, new retail merchandise, and improved our booth. We focused on content creation and creating fun and engaging posts which our fans loved.
We soon found ourselves participating in California’s largest festivals and conventions and worked alongside industry veterans who would help us by giving us tips, suggestions, and support.
With each passing event, I still found myself longing for the ultimate goal- establishing a permanent location for our beloved maid cafe. Knowing the difficulties in starting a brick-and-mortar business, the team knew that we had to be patient and look towards the right opportunities.
In the Fall of 2023, a mutual friend invited us to visit one of their businesses which needed help in promotions and maintenance. A few conversations later, he mentioned that there was a space that was available that might be suitable for a pop-up cafe. We toured the location and being familiar with the area, knew it needed a lot of work for it to match with the quality and expectations our customers would want. We wanted our maid cafe not to just be an excellent coffee shop cafe, but also an outstanding maid cafe that shows the story and journey that we took throughout the years. We accomplished this by creating a manga-esque atmosphere with photos depicting the milestones we had throughout the years.
So in Winter of 2023, we made an agreement to renovate the space. We maintained that as much of the work must be done by our team- to keep it as authentic to what we wanted and to match our brand image. We started the project’s construction in October and completed in February, with all permits and licensing completed.
We soft opened our maid cafe in late March, but had to hold off to focus on our Anime Festival, AniFest in Torrance. We continued our silent and soft opening in late April and officially soft-opened in May.
Maid Cafes being a rarity in Los Angeles, and even more so in the United States, caught the attention of several influencers who created viral content that reached millions of people. We soon found ourselves overwhelmed with the amount of guests and patrons who wanted to experience a piece of Akihabara culture in their city. The wait times would sometimes exceed two hours.
Now our cafe is slowly exiting our soft-opening phase, and we have no plans to have a grand opening. We decided this because we are focused on improving our maid cafe until we feel that we are ready. Our future plans include to host special events, collaborate with live music performers, and invite content creators to our beloved maid cafe.
We hope to see you at Arcane Maid Cafe, goshujin-sama!
Irasshaimase! Welcome to Arcane Maid Cafe!
Can you talk to us a bit about the challenges and lessons you’ve learned along the way. Looking back would you say it’s been easy or smooth in retrospect?
Our Maid Cafe experienced many obstacles and challenges:
The Pandemic:
Being a pop-up cafe for most of its years, the COVID-19 pandemic caused us to be in an indefinite hiatus which saddened many of our cafe staff and fans. We decided not to have a COVID-19 compliant event or digital event because we felt it wasn’t a good experience for what we wanted to produce.
Our maid cafe came close to disbanding in the second year of the pandemic due to the uncertainty it caused, but we were lucky in that the pandemic mandates were eased.
Thankfully, we took this time to further improve our maid cafe’s digital footprint and also learn from the best in the industry. We were very lucky to have reunited after the COVID-19 pandemic and being reinvited to events by our partners.
Food boothing:
Operating a food booth was one of the most challenging things for our maid cafe. On a logistical standpoint, creating a mobile kitchen was difficult as it is. But to maintain a steady stream of supplies, training staff, and creating a mobile maid cafe experience involved many different disciplines which were covered by our skilled staff and friends.
Building of the Maid Cafe:
Our maid cafe was built on an older building which required major renovation. It involved demolition, construction, and obtaining permits which took over two months to get. While we had skilled staff, there were many setbacks such as concrete work, drainage lines, electrical fixes, and numerous other minor fixes.
Nonetheless, we have been very lucky to make it this far, and we are grateful for so many amazing friends and staff who were here with us.
Appreciate you sharing that. What should we know about Arcane Maid Cafe?
Our maid café is known for being the first bone fide and completely independent maid café in California. Though there have been others who have partnered and have extended pop-up cafes, Arcane Maid Cafe is unique in that we have all the necessary permits, licenses, and signage that makes it the first real and permanent maid cafe location.
We provide our customers with specialty drinks such as Taiwanese style Boba drinks, fresh bean-to-cup espresso drinks, authentic Japanese food, and European specialties. Everything is made to order.
The majority of our food supplies are imported from Japan, with the exception of our meats, egg, and vegetables. Those are sourced in the United States.
Our coffees are completely bean-to-cup espresso and made with whole fresh milk (with milk alternatives available). Our bubble tea drinks are made with imported Taiwanese ingredients.
We feel that our maid café is different from others because we were one of the first to have a first-come, first-served approach. While most maid cafe’s are entry-fee or schedule based, Arcane Maid Cafe is a full-service sit down café. This allows our maid café to cater to maid café enthusiasts while simultaneously allowing your everyday local patron to enjoy an afternoon coffee, tea, or meal.
We are exceptionally proud of our staff’s professionalism and dedication in our project, and our relentless and never-ending pursuit to perfecting our service and products.
We are also exceptionally proud of having the support of the local community and convention community. Our café is home to many regulars to visit everyday to enjoy their favorite drink and meal.
What do you like best about our city? What do you like least?
We love the opportunities, diverse cultures, the frequent events that is ever present in the great City of Los Angeles. We display the U.S. Flag in our doorway because we feel that the American spirit and American dream is still present in Los Angeles. The City of Arcadia has been extraordinarily helpful in supporting our small café, and have been instrumental in assisting our opening. The vast majority of guests that visit are kind, understanding, and enjoy their time at our maid café.
There are many things we loved about the City of Los Angeles, however, no city is perfect. We feel that the crime rate is higher than we would like, despite the best efforts of law enforcement and community watch. There are certainly, “bad apples” out there who attempt to take advantage of our business, but these occurrences are very few and far in between.
Pricing:
- Bubble tea $4-6
- Espresso coffees $4-6
- Omurice Omelette Curry Rice $16
- Pork Katsu Curry Rice $15
- Desserts $6-14
Contact Info:
- Website: https://arcanecafe.com
- Instagram: https://instagram.com/arcanemaidcafe
- Facebook: https://facebook.com/arcanecafe
- Twitter: https://twitter.com/arcanemaidcafe
- Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/@ArcaneCafe
- Yelp: https://www.yelp.com/biz/arcane-maid-cafe-arcadia
Image Credits
Drew K.
Nathan C.
