Boo Han Father of the International Business District

Few families illustrate the success at the International Business District in Lakewood like the Han family.

What started out as a small tofu-making operation in a back room of a Lakewood house is now an anchor tenant at the heart of the city's district.

Boo Han settled in Lakewood after emigrating from South Korea in 1973. He had a small house along Lakeview Avenue and raised his family, making tofu as a means of income in a garage on the property. It may have been small, but the operation was the start of his multimillion-dollar empire.

It was a time when Lakewood had a few Korean immigrants, largely with ties to soldiers from Fort Lewis. He then opened an Asian grocery store that became a community center of sorts for Asian Americans looking for food and other cultural products.

The grocery store expanded in 1990 to what is now the Boo Han Plaza. The Han family later expanded its operations in Edmonds and Federal Way.

But the store in Lakewood gave rise to an International Business District—with a sizeable Korean community—as Asian businesses moved into the area one by one.

The Han family is currently planning the biggest development in the District to date called the Boo Han Village.

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For a few years, there was a sign that read South Korean Way in the Korean language under the English sign of International Business District. Korean-run businesses quickly expanded and passed the formal District boundaries, stretching as far north as B&I and south to Pacific Highway near state Route 512.

Although outside the district, the rest of South Tacoma Way—within the city of Lakewood—has a strong Korean-owned business respresentation. Lakewood has a population of about 60,000—according to the latest Census figures—and an Asian-Pacific Islander population of approximately 11 percent, almost double the state average of 6.7 percent and second only to Seattle.

Han played a role in creating that distinction.