Waiting for a Buyer for Shiki Japanese Steak House

The unmistakable building of Middletown's Shiki Japanese Steak House has seen better days.

The now-vacated Route 35 property waits for a buyer to develop its assets, either as another restaurant or an entirely different venue. The familiar sign that faces the street is cracked, and the unfamiliar sign next to that, alerting its “for sale” status, serves to tell all that the best days for the former area hub for nouveau Japanese dining are long gone.

When the restaurant opened in mid-1970s, it was a small sensation in the area, not merely for the more exotic Japanese cuisine and entertaining hibachi-style preparations, but for the architecture itself.

Middletown Township Planning Director Jason Greenspan recalled his surprise upon looking at the original plans that were filed for the site. “We were shocked; the designs for the sign and all were almost exact to how the building actually turned out," he said. "Usually there’s a lot of variation between the plan and what actually gets built.”

In its day the novelty of Shiki was a big draw, often incurring an overflowing parking lot with potential patrons being turned away. Now the sushi restaurant market is saturated, the realtor pointed out. Going out for sushi or a little Japanese hibachi for dinner is as common as grabbing a slice of pizza for lunch.

The property has now been on the market for three years, vacant for more than one, and has been the subject of only a small handful of abandoned development proposals.

“Potential buyers have been interested in the property for different uses,” said Greenspan. “Wawa was interested in developing it into a convenience store and gas station, but they withdrew their interest. It never even got on the Planning Board agenda. There was also a proposed retail center with a farmer’s market, but that plan never really had any momentum.”

Debra Yuro, secretary of the township's  Zoning Board, retrieved the original plans from the township files for Middletown Patch. According to those plans, the original building application was dated July 30, 1976. The restaurant was the second Shiki location, while the first was located in Union. Both locations are now out of business.

The property is being handled by The Goldstein Group, a commercial real estate agency specializing in the retail sector. Chuck Lanyard, president of  Goldstein, feels that its vacant status will not remain as such for long. “The economy is opening up," he said. "(The economic downturn) is really the main reason why the property has taken so long to move, because, otherwise this (site) has a lot of great potential.”

Lanyard cites the all-important location of the building, on a highly visible section of Route 35. “We call this a bedroom commuter community (in the commercial real estate business)," he explained. "The highway sees about 40,000 cars passing by each day, and there are 135,000 people within a five-mile radius living here (in and around Middletown).”

The physical site provides several business-attractive options, Lanyard said. Should a buyer choose to remain with a restaurant as the prime business, there is ample parking space, direct connections to the highway and the building’s infrastructure is ready for the food service industry, he said. Also, the property is attached to a highly sought-after New Jersey liquor license, he added. If a buyer decides to go another development route, there is plenty of property for either permitted retail or office use.  

The original company that owned Shiki could not be determined by the provided materials, but both Greenspan and Lanyard agreed that the restaurant appeared to fall victim to the economic crisis, coupled with the expansion of the Japanese cuisine ethic from an exotic novelty to a more-recognized, available choice for consumers. With demand on the wane and customers less interested in the building's then unique, modern 70's-style aesthetics, the closure of Shiki seemed almost inevitable, they agreed.