The Story of Fuji Kim’s Sushi & Grill

Today on Trade Local, Andy Kim tells us all about his family’s restaurant, Fuji Kim’s.

Welcome to another edition of Trade Local, brought to you by the Chad Raney Team and Keller Williams. Our Trade Local series is here to bring your awareness to local businesses. 

Today, we’re talking to Andy Kim from Fuji Kim’s Sushi and Grill. The Kim family came here from South Korea and became American citizens. They are a great family who has had a lot of triumph and some tragedies throughout the years. Through it all, they have become a closer family and built a great business here in town based on great relationships, great service, and great food. 

So, what’s the history behind Fuji Kim’s? 

Andy is the manager at Fuji Kim’s. “I was born and raised in Seoul, and we came to the U.S. about 18 years ago, when I was 11 years old. The first city we moved to was Nashville, AR. My parents had a job in Texarkana as servers, so they commuted back and forth every single day.” 

Andy’s family decided to move to Texarkana to cut down on the commute, and they have been here for about 17 years.

“We’ve been in the restaurant business ever since we moved to the states,” says Andy. “My parents worked very hard for all this time and I wanted to help out, so when I turned 16, I started working in the restaurant business and haven’t stopped.”

Andy’s family worked at a local Japanese restaurant for six or seven years when tragedy struck. “We lost my sister in a car accident,” says Andy. “It was hard for a long time. One of the dreams she always had was to open our own restaurant, so we decided to open Fuji Kim’s to honor her memory. So that’s how this came about. It’s not just a restaurant for us; it’s everything, really.” 

Andy’s family opened Fuji Kim’s to honor his sister’s memory.

Choosing a name was a little difficult. “We couldn’t think of a name that was somewhat Japanese-related, so we thought, ‘What is the most Japanese word we could think of?’ And we remembered Fuji, like Mount Fuji,” Andy explains. “So we chose that and added our last name at the end. We wanted to put our name out there so it represents us because it’s our restaurant. That’s how the name came about.”

Fuji Kim’s is a Japanese restaurant, but Andy says, “Since we are Koreans, we like to incorporate Korean flavor into our food. So we serve sushi and grilled entrees, but we also serve Korean barbecue. We are the only ones who serve it in town.” 

Andy goes on, saying, “Our most popular item is the fried rice. We go through about 1,900 pounds of rice every two weeks, and most of that goes into the fried rice. Then we have our sushi. Some people call it traditional, but I don’t want to call it traditional because I’m not Japanese and it’s our own style of sushi. A lot of people like it. We’ve been voted the No. 1 Asian/sushi restaurant in the area many times over the past decade, so I think people like it very much.” 

Fuji Kim’s is located at 2830 Richmond Road and is open Monday through Saturday. Monday through Thursday, the restaurant is open from 11 a.m. to 9 p.m. On Friday and Saturday, the restaurant is open from 11 a.m. to 10 p.m. Since it’s a family restaurant, they get to choose which holidays to close for; usually, though, they only close for the Fourth of July, Thanksgiving, and Christmas. 

Andy would like to take a moment to thank their customers. “Without them, we wouldn’t be here. I wouldn’t be able to have what I have, and we’re definitely blessed to have a good customer base. Because of them, we get to open up a scholarship at Texarkana College under my sister’s name every semester. I have incredible customers and I want to thank every single one of them, I really do.” 

Fuji Kim’s has been a personal favorite of mine for many years. It’s a great place to gather with family and friends to enjoy some delicious food. If you have any questions for Andy, you can reach him at (903) 334-6903. 

As always, if you have any questions for me, just give me a call or send me an email. Let me know if you would like your business to be featured on Trade Local, too. I look forward to hearing from you!