Mothers raising young children are often shunned by Japan Inc. due to company concerns of the interference of family commitments. One young entrepreneur, however, has created an alternative for working parents: flexible work hours on her own cherry tomato farm.
Drop Inc. — a startup located in a forest in Mito, Ibaraki Prefecture, about an hour and 40-minute drive northeast of Tokyo — currently hires a dozen women and two men to farm sweet cherry tomatoes that are sold online as well as at upscale department stores and supermarkets.
With family-friendly hours, requests from mothers to work at the company's Drop Farm greenhouses have come flooding in.