The encyclopedia · Strategy & Leadership · Strategic decision · 2015–2020
Tokyo One Piece Tower gave the Straw Hats a theme park — it lasted five years
Tokyo One Piece Tower, the indoor One Piece park inside Tokyo Tower since March 2015, closed on 31 July 2020 as the pandemic made indoor parks unworkable.
Amusequest Tokyo Tower · 2020-07
What happened
On 13 March 2015, Tokyo One Piece Tower opened across four floors at the foot of Tokyo Tower: an indoor theme park built around Eiichiro Oda's One Piece, operated by Amusequest Tokyo Tower LLP. Each Straw Hat crew member got an attraction — Luffy's Endless Adventure, Zoro's Soul of Edge, Nami's Casino House, Brook's Horror House — plus a live show on the fifth floor, Sanji's Oresama Restaurant and the Mugiwara stores. A partial renovation in June 2016 refreshed the lineup.
The park ran into two structural problems before the pandemic arrived: attendance was on a long-term decline and maintenance costs stayed high. When the coronavirus hit in early 2020, the indoor park shut with the rest of Tokyo's attractions under Japan's state of emergency.
After the emergency was lifted, the operators studied reopening under infection-prevention rules and concluded they could not maintain the park's service quality inside an enclosed indoor facility while managing health risks. On 3 July 2020 they announced permanent closure on 31 July; as a farewell, the park reopened free of charge from 18 to 31 July under limited capacity. Creator Eiichiro Oda marked the end with a farewell illustration. Five years after opening, One Piece's home in Tokyo Tower was gone.
Why it happened
- Attendance was already declining and maintenance costs were high before the pandemic added the final shock.
- An enclosed indoor park could not meet post-emergency health rules without degrading the experience.
- The operator judged that reopening at reduced quality would damage the One Piece brand more than closing.
The lesson
Tokyo One Piece Tower was already shrinking — falling attendance against high maintenance costs — when the pandemic arrived; an indoor park can't socially distance, so it closed.
Aftermath
The park closed permanently on 31 July 2020; One Piece Tower never returned to Tokyo Tower.
Sources
- Wikipedia — Tokyo One Piece Tower (opened 13 March 2015 inside Tokyo Tower at Shiba Park, Minato, on floors 1F, 3F, 4F and 5F; operated by Amusequest Tokyo Tower LLP; attractions per Straw Hat crew member — Luffy's Endless Adventure, Zoro's Soul of Edge, Nami's Casino House, Usopp's Road to Sogeking, Chopper's Thousand Sunny Tours, Robin's Finding Poneglyph, Franky's Park, Brook's Horror House — plus the One Piece Live Attraction and Sanji's Oresama Restaurant; partial renovation reopened 18 June 2016; closed 31 July 2020 citing the impact of the coronavirus pandemic on management)
- The Library of Ohara, 4 July 2020 — One Piece Tokyo Tower to permanently close its doors (closure announced for 31 July 2020; operators cited long-term attendance decline and high maintenance costs compounded by the coronavirus shutdown; after the state of emergency they studied reopening with infection-prevention measures and concluded continuing at the required service standard was not feasible; farewell free reopening 18–31 July 2020 under limited entry capacity; opened 13 March 2015 at the base of Tokyo Tower and ran five years)
spotted an error? The club wants to know.
More like this
Yokohama Dreamland ran 37 years — a ¥10bn debt ultimatum closed it in 2002
Kawaii Monster Cafe bet on Tokyo's Olympic tourists — then the pandemic closed it
Oedo Onsen drew a million visitors a year — its lease had an expiry date
Somewhere, someone solved the problem this company failed at. 2nd Opinion →
Comments · 0
Sign in to join the comments.