The little L.A. shop was a destination for Hello Kitty fans for decades when it decided to dive into a massive new wave of e-commerce — peddling its products live on TikTok.

The first floor of the JapanLA store in Fairfax is full of stuffed toys. It houses shelf after shelf of cute Japanese characters such as My Melody, Totoro and Kuromi. Upstairs is the real moneymaker. Employees stand in front of phones, pitching the hottest new products of kawaii (cute in Japanese) culture.

While the upstairs business has brought in tens of thousands of new customers, it has also attracted trolls trying to shut JapanLA down. The haters have hacked the store’s website, harassed its hosts, spread rumors about its owner, and threatened to show up in force in front of its physical store.

JapanLA owner Jamie Rivadeneira says she has never seen cute consumers turn so ugly.

“I created JapanLA 20 years ago for adults who like cute stuff, so they can feel safe and feel like it’s OK to like toys and collect them,” she said. “To attack me is so opposite of what I stand for.”

It is a cautionary tale that points to the potential profit and pitfalls when small local businesses push back against the onslaught of e-commerce by using technology to reach a wider audience. It also demonstrates how the Labubu craze — in which people keep buying blind boxes of the same toys in hopes of getting a rare, expensive one — has turned some shops into casinos.

Rivadeneira was ahead of the curve when she opened a small toy shop in 2006 on a street off Melrose Avenue selling items featuring Hello Kitty and other Japanese characters.

From its early days, the store, called JapanLA, harnessed the internet to promote its products, using MySpace to connect with what was at the time a niche community: Los Angeles fans of kawaii culture. As it kawaii culture went mainstream, JapanLA grew into a 5,000-square-foot retail space on La Brea Avenue with more than 20 employees.

Although its store continues to attract a steady flow of walk-in customers looking for the cutting edge of cute, JapanLA’s business has been turbo-charged in recent years by livestream shopping.

Livestream shopping, also called social commerce, is like the old cable shopping channels, but there are millions of shows, each serving a very specific niche, broadcasting live. The hosts interact with the shoppers watching. It started in Asia, is worth hundreds of billions of dollars in sales, and has been growing fast in the U.S.

JapanLA first dabbled in livestream shopping during the pandemic lockdown, when it had to close its store. It started on a platform called Popshoplive to sell Hello Kitty and other items, but sales didn’t skyrocket until it switched to TikTok Shop in 2023.

Kelly Parks broadcasts a JapanLA auction on TikTok.

(Ronaldo Bolaños / Los Angeles Times)

Today, JapanLA’s TikTok account has nearly 400,000 followers and hosts seven-hour livestream shopping sessions six days a week. The shop’s 12 bubbly livestream hosts have turned into micro-celebrities. Their customers comment in the livestream’s chat, order hundreds of products during a session, and sometimes send tips and the occasional boba.

Uma Karmarkar, an associate professor at UC San Diego who studies consumer psychology, said livestreams are effective at getting consumers to spend more because they are engaging and temporary — meaning they tap into people’s fear of missing out on a rare opportunity.

When it comes to collectible blind boxes, the effect is heightened, she said.

“You’re adding to that element of scarcity that makes blind boxes so appealing in the first place,” Karmarkar said. “You don’t know what you’re getting, and it’s effectively like gambling.”

Various Smiski boxes lie in a box for clients at JapanLA.

(Ronaldo Bolaños / Los Angeles Times)

JapanLA’s chat and sales exploded in the last two years, driven by demand for the cherubic figurines of a Japanese doll named Sonny Angels.

For certain consumers, it was the new Labubu: cute and collectible, sold in blind boxes, with certain types being rare and thus much more valuable.

Sonny Angels are three-inch plastic dolls that are generally naked, except for themed headgear and costumes.

JapanLA had unique access to the suddenly popular toys, as it had stocked Sonny Angels for 15 years. It originally had a niche following, but the fan base blew up in recent years. It was even at the center of a “Saturday Night Live” sketch featuring singer Dua Lipa.

JapanLA is still selling thousands of Sonny Angel dolls, but bids now tend to stay around $20.

(Ronaldo Bolaños / Los Angeles Times)

JapanLA was auctioning the rarest Sonny Angels for hundreds of dollars, and that started bothering some fans of the fat little collectibles. In July, while taking bids for figurines from the Sonny Angels summer vacation-themed collection, one of the rare ones got a bid of more than $400. Some viewers used screenshots of the offer to accuse JapanLA of gouging.

Online detractors shared screenshots of the supposed $400 bid in a Sonny Angel collectors Facebook group with more than 30,000 members and launched a form-letter campaign, mass-emailing Dreams USA to try to get JapanLA’s retail license revoked.

“They’re trump supporters, what do you expect? Grifters,” one anonymous commenter said in the Facebook group.

“Report them for hoarding,” said another.

During livestream shopping sessions, JapanLA’s hosts received a flood of mean comments, including insults about their physical appearance and accusations that they were racist. Bad actors entered live auctions to place fake bids on items for up to $1,000 before letting the payments fail, she said.

A TikTok user made a dedicated account to “cancel” Japan. A flood of anonymous commenters spread rumors that JapanLA’s owner supports Immigration and Customs Enforcement. Rivadeneira denies the claims. A hacking attack even shut down JapanLA’s website for a day.

One Discord user posted a threat to hand out hundreds of fliers at the store’s physical Sonny Angel launch event later that morning, falsely claiming that owners supported ICE to discourage would-be shoppers. The agitator never appeared, but the threat left the staff on edge throughout the day.

The company tried to report and block the trolls, but they kept popping up with new profiles. It hired a PR firm to manage the unfolding crisis. Rivadeneira said she even scrubbed her personal social media accounts of photos of her young daughter after trolls began attacking loved ones.

JapanLA turned to Dreams, the company behind Sonny Angels, for support. The two companies decided to change the way the figurines were auctioned to avoid the gouging narrative. Now they are auctioned before they are opened rather than after, so bidders don’t know what they are getting.

Jackie Bonheim, a spokesperson for Dreams USA, said that while the company received a flood of form-letter emails from angry Sonny Angels fans, the company cannot set a maximum retail price.

Ava B. showcases and unboxes a Sonny Angel during a TikTok live auction at JapanLA.

(Ronaldo Bolanos/Los Angeles Times)

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JapanLA is still selling thousands of Sonny Angel dolls, but bids now tend to stay around $20.

Some fans miss the days when they would know ahead of time if they were getting a really rare one.

Nicole Fani, 40, snapped up a rare “secret” unicorn Sonny Angel for more than $300 because she had to have it for her collection of hundreds of the figures.

“I’m not going to say for anybody else they should be spending that much,” she said. “It was worth it for me.”

Fani, a Brentwood artist, considers her collection an extension of her art and has embellished some with Swarovski crystals. Because she avoids buying secondhand Sonny Angels due to potential fakes, she would have probably spent more buying dozens of sealed blind boxes in the hopes of pulling the unicorn figure.

JapanLA‘s owner says her team is working every day to block and silence trolls. She‘s still reeling from how quickly her business went from a bumper batch of orders to battling for its life.

“I couldn’t believe it,” she said. “All it takes is a few people to say bad things or say things about JapanLA, things about me, that aren’t true, for it to just go crazy.”

For years, Hollywood has talked about a federal film and television tax credit that could help the industry combat the growing number of productions fleeing overseas.

This week, the entertainment business got a glimmer of hope.

After more than a year of quiet work from California lawmakers, industry lobbyists and Hollywood unions to build a bipartisan coalition, President Trump endorsed the effort in a post on his social media website, providing a major boost for the issue.

If passed, a federal incentive is expected to help draw some productions back to the Golden State, industry experts and advocates said. Although it probably won’t immediately end Southern California’s production crisis — as many states now have established film hubs stocked with experienced crews and more generous tax breaks — an added federal credit certainly could help make California more competitive, they said.

“I will put our crews and our talent against any talent anywhere in the world,” said U.S. Rep. Laura Friedman (D-Glendale), a former producer who has been pushing for a national film tax credit. “If we have a level playing field upon which to shoot, where we are not much more expensive than other locations, productions will come back to Los Angeles.”

Trump’s post came after a meeting with actor Jon Voight, one of the president’s designated Hollywood ambassadors who has played a key role in lobbying for the film industry and advocating for a federal tax credit. Though Trump has had frosty relations with Hollywood, particularly since many heavyweights did not support his presidential campaign, the industry’s jobs push aligns with his focus on reshoring work, marking a rare moment of agreement.

Speaking to reporters in the Oval Office, Trump said Wednesday that he has done “a lot of work” in the last week to get something done on federal tax incentives for the film and television industry.

Trump said he has spoken to streaming giant Netflix; Ari Emanuel, chief executive of TKO Group Holdings Inc.; and “many others,” and that he is hopeful there will be a bipartisan push to revive productions in Hollywood with “big subsidies and big credits.”

“We don’t give anything and we should,” Trump said, referring to proposed tax breaks for U.S. productions. He added that he wants legislation to “match” what other countries are offering.

Now, lawmakers must hammer out the details of that legislation.

The bill will have a Republican sponsor from a state known for film and TV production, but Friedman declined to name the person, saying she was waiting for Republicans to make their internal decision about that lead lawmaker.

The bill is likely to go through the House Committee on Ways and Means. Although exact provisions are still being negotiated, the expectation is that the credit will be stackable with states’ incentives — similar to how Canada’s tax credit works. A 20% federal tax credit on all labor costs — including for salaries of actors and crew members — is being discussed.

An earlier proposal from U.S. Sen. Adam Schiff (D-Calif.) had called for a baseline labor-based tax credit of 15% to 20%, in addition to bonus add-ons for independent productions among others, a Schiff spokesperson said.

Schiff previously noted that 45% of all U.S. films and scripted TV shows were shot internationally last year, up from about 33% in 2022.

Having Schiff and Trump on the same side of this national tax credit is emblematic of the odd bedfellows the effort has engendered.

The Motion Picture Assn. studio lobbying group has released a statement backing the proposal, as have unions such as the Screen Actors Guild — American Federation of Television and Radio Artists, the Directors Guild of America and the International Alliance of Theatrical Stage Employees.

“I am in strong agreement with the President,” Schiff wrote Monday in a post on X. “Congress should immediately take up and pass a federal film tax incentive to bring back these good-paying jobs that we’ve lost to other countries.”

Production incentive experts say any national film tax credit will need to have a seamless process, one with minimal red tape.

One idea is to make the national production incentive an overlay that’s attached to states’ incentives, so the federal government doesn’t need a separate agency to vet the same criteria, which could slow the process, said Peter Marshall, managing principal of media insurance services at Epic, an insurance broker and consultant.

Parameters will also need to be clear, and the program easy to access, said Kathleen Thompson, vice president of tax incentives at payroll service Cast & Crew.

“There is an excitement and an energy and a hopefulness right now from the production community,” she said. “I’ve certainly gotten notes from clients, potential clients and industry colleagues that are very excited about the possibility of this passing and becoming a reality.”

Stacking a federal tax credit on top of the newly bolstered California production incentives could help give the state an edge when producers are pricing out location shoots.

“California is still the leader in production,” said Joe Chianese, senior vice president at Entertainment Partners, which tracks production incentives worldwide. “Producers would like to stay home if they can, but it boils down to the math.”

But even with the improvements to California’s film and TV tax credits, the state’s program still has limitations.

California has an annual funding cap of $750 million, designated application windows and allows the cost of actors’ salaries — a major driver of movie budgets — to be counted toward the tax breaks.

Beyond the program, the Golden State is just more expensive than other U.S. locales, and some filmmakers have criticized the red tape that makes shooting in L.A. more difficult.

“Can we be more competitive with a federal incentive? Absolutely,” Thompson said. “Can it completely turn the tide? I don’t know, but I hope so for our industry and our state.”

Industry stakeholders say they are hoping for quick movement on the issue, particularly since it probably will take more than a year after any tax credit is passed for producers to start making plans to move filming back to the U.S., due to lengthy production timelines for movies and TV shows.

“There is a ticking clock,” said Marshall of Epic. “If something isn’t done by the end of the year or in sight, there will be a further solidification of offshoring.”

For Peter Max-Muller, owner of the Ruby, a North Hollywood contemporary clothing rental business, the loss of film and TV shoots in L.A. is one of many threats his business faces, in addition to the use of AI production.

His sales typically mirror the production data from the nonprofit FilmLA, which recorded a 13% drop in shoot days in L.A. County in the second quarter compared with the same period a year earlier.

The goal of a federal incentive, Max-Muller said, “is that we get that runaway production back.”

It’s why Friedman said she is pushing to get the tax credit legislation done as soon as possible.

“The film industry is deep in the identity of Los Angeles,” she said. “And it’s worth saving.”

Times staff writer Ana Ceballos contributed to this report.

El Segundo-based caregiving company 24 Hour Home Care is laying off more than 700 people.

24 Hour Home Care hires around 30,000 caregivers in California for people with disabilities and veterans, and partners with regional facilities around the state and major Medi-Cal health plans.

A Worker Adjustment and Retraining Notification letter said the company is laying off 738 employees in September.

The company did not respond to requests for comment.

The filing, dated Aug. 31, said the layoffs will happen on Sept. 15, sooner than the 60 days notice required by the state.

The company said it will pay caregivers through Oct. 23 for hours they would have worked, and cited the unanticipated ending of a “material third-party service arrangement” as the reason behind the cuts, the San Francisco Chronicle reported.

Two other healthcare companies in the Bay Area are also issuing nearly 200 layoffs.

Stanford Health Care is laying off 95 employees in Palo Alto, an Aug. 28 filing showed.

Hospital network John Muir Health in Contra Costa County is cutting 78 jobs across multiple locations including Walnut Creek, Concord and Pleasanton, according to government filings from Aug. 27.

These companies follow a steady stream of healthcare cuts this year after federal funding losses.

In early August, Dignity Health cut 139 jobs at hospitals in Los Angeles and Bakersfield.

On Aug. 19, Sharp HealthCare in San Diego announced plans to lay off 168 employees. Last September, it laid off 394 people.

In March, the Los Angeles County Department of Public Health ended clinical services at seven of its public health clinic sites after losing $50 million in funding.

The same month, UC Irvine Health laid off 150 employees in a “strategic restructuring.”