Nah the first Hooters is 1983 whereas the first maid cafe is 1920s, and even before that back in the Meiji period (1860s) Japan had "Kissa" which were coffee shops with a "service" atmosphere which were basically always women. The addition of the maid uniform was just added to the Kissa to create the Maid Kissa.

Culturally this was probably successful because historic Geisha culture had already rooted the service culture and turning Geisha into Maids was just a western exotification of the same thing.

It was the late 90s early 2000s where these maid cafes boomed to 300+ venues in Akihabara though, which I would guess was caused by Japan's economic downturn and men seeking forms of fantasy escapism.

[–] WhatDoYouMeanPodcast@hexbear.net 2 points 7 hours ago (1 children)

I stand corrected! Tytyty

[–] Awoo@hexbear.net 1 points 7 hours ago

I wanna stress a bunch of this is my speculation. Only the dates and numbers are true and the culture stuff about why it succeeded is mostly guesswork.