Most of the milk produced in Japan ends up as milk and not other dairy products. Since the demand for milk has held steady or decreased in recent years, the major dairy companies are aiming to replace a good deal of the imported natural cheese with domestic natural cheese.
As a result, a number of large natural cheese factories have opened in the past year. The June 1st issue of the Hokkaido Shimbun gave some details on the new factories and new production capacity. The numbers below are given in tons of raw milk used yearly.
Meiji Dairies
200,000 tons
Snow Brand
200,000 tons
Morinaga Milk
150,000 tons
Previously domestic natural cheese production was very limited. Expect to see a large number of new cheese products in the coming months.
2008-08-14
2008-08-13
Supermarket Circulars in Japan
One more website which might be of interest to people looking for information on Japanese products, which was brought to my attention on the Japan Marketing News blog.
Japanese supermarket sales depend on supermarket circulars which come with daily newspapers. If you want to stick with the same product, but get it at the cheapest price, you are likely to have to keep up with the circulars and buy at a different store each week depending on where it is on sale.
I have read that this is why Walmart, through its Seiyu department stores in Japan, have not been able to get across the everyday low prices concept. Most Japanese shoppers, read housewives, still think about supermarket circulars first.
Here is a website where many of the supermarket circulars are reproduced.
Japanese supermarket sales depend on supermarket circulars which come with daily newspapers. If you want to stick with the same product, but get it at the cheapest price, you are likely to have to keep up with the circulars and buy at a different store each week depending on where it is on sale.
I have read that this is why Walmart, through its Seiyu department stores in Japan, have not been able to get across the everyday low prices concept. Most Japanese shoppers, read housewives, still think about supermarket circulars first.
Here is a website where many of the supermarket circulars are reproduced.
2008-08-12
Company Histories
There is one more website I would like to mention. Information in English on Japanese companies is getting a little bit easier to find than in the past, but is still not what it should be. I just came across a website called Funding Universe and for some reason they have a big list of company histories on the website.
Many Japanese company histories are included, but some are very much out of date. Nevertheless, it is an interesting place to start when you have struck out everywhere else.
Many Japanese company histories are included, but some are very much out of date. Nevertheless, it is an interesting place to start when you have struck out everywhere else.
2008-08-11
Everything About Can Drinks
I mentioned an interesting blog yesterday, and today I would like to introduce a fascinating website devoted to can drinks in Japan, called Can Can Jiten (dictionary). I don't see any information about the author, but somebody has been going to the trouble since 1999 of recording all the information from the labels of all the canned drinks he or she can find. The result is a fairly amazing archive of data on almost 9,000 different drink cans. If you are interested in such things, you can spend hours on this site looking at the different products or the changes in a single product over time. Well done. I don't have that much free time or energy, but it is nice someone else does though.
2008-08-10
Vending Machine Blog
There is a very eccentric and yet fascinating blog in Japanese about the daily changes made to a specific Japanese vending machine. Only the title of the blog is in Japanese, all the rest is shown through daily pictures of the vending machine. Most days there are no changes, but once every 10 days or so, certain drinks are replaced by new offerings. With this daily record, it is easy to see that these changes and the placement of the drinks is not random. Worth a look.
I first became aware of this blog through Neil Duckett's blog.
I first became aware of this blog through Neil Duckett's blog.
2008-08-09
The Health Report - Reliability of Published Research
What if everything we know is wrong - or at least 90 percent of what we think we know.
There was a very interesting topic covered in The Health Report on July 28th concerning the reliability of published research data.
Professor John Ioannidis, Chairman of the Department of Hygiene and Epidemiology University of Ioannina Greece and Tufts University Boston, claims that 90 percent of research findings end up being false. There are a number of reasons given in an article he authored as well as the show transcpript and podcast. I highly recommend both.
His major point appears to boil down to the fact that p > 0.5, while generally recognized as being significant, is susceptible to false positives when huge amounts of data are being trolled for any possible associations. Only 10 percent of these associations pan out following further investigation.
Another way to view the same thing is if 10 groups study an association and only one group finds a significant association, that is the paper which gets published.
There was a very interesting topic covered in The Health Report on July 28th concerning the reliability of published research data.
Professor John Ioannidis, Chairman of the Department of Hygiene and Epidemiology University of Ioannina Greece and Tufts University Boston, claims that 90 percent of research findings end up being false. There are a number of reasons given in an article he authored as well as the show transcpript and podcast. I highly recommend both.
His major point appears to boil down to the fact that p > 0.5, while generally recognized as being significant, is susceptible to false positives when huge amounts of data are being trolled for any possible associations. Only 10 percent of these associations pan out following further investigation.
Another way to view the same thing is if 10 groups study an association and only one group finds a significant association, that is the paper which gets published.
2008-08-08
Beer Company Non-Alcohol Drink Sales
All the major beer companies also have non-alcohol drink units also which are important to the companies. Suntory and Kirin even challenge Coca Cola.
There was an article in today's Nikkei MJ outlining the announced the recent sales and earnings figures. I mention it here to give those interested an idea of the size of these sales. The units are in "oku" yen or hundred million yen and are projected 2008 sales through the end of the year.
Suntory 8,495
Kirin 4,180
Asahi 2,740
Sapporo 378
There was an article in today's Nikkei MJ outlining the announced the recent sales and earnings figures. I mention it here to give those interested an idea of the size of these sales. The units are in "oku" yen or hundred million yen and are projected 2008 sales through the end of the year.
Suntory 8,495
Kirin 4,180
Asahi 2,740
Sapporo 378
2008-08-07
Menthol Flavored Can Coffee
This strikes me as odd. I associate menthol with cigarettes, although that does not necessarily have to be the case. I am not really sure what the target group is, but Kirin will introduce a new canned coffee flavored with menthol.
2008-08-06
Hot Summer 2
Speaking of seasonal foods, one offering I like during Japanese hot weather is cold noodles. Japanese eat noodles as meals in Japan, but a huge bowl of hot noodles will cause you to sweat profusely.
Nice alternatives are cold noodle dishes such as reimen (冷麺), a cold ramen dish, or somen (素麺) which is made from different ingredients and is often served on ice. Reimen has a stronger taste, while somen depends just on the taste of the noodles and the diluted soy sauce based dip. Somen really cannot be beat and I know of Japanese who choose somen for their first meal back in Japan after a long overseas trip.
Nice alternatives are cold noodle dishes such as reimen (冷麺), a cold ramen dish, or somen (素麺) which is made from different ingredients and is often served on ice. Reimen has a stronger taste, while somen depends just on the taste of the noodles and the diluted soy sauce based dip. Somen really cannot be beat and I know of Japanese who choose somen for their first meal back in Japan after a long overseas trip.
2008-08-05
Hot Summer
Ever since the rainy season ended, it has been very hot here in Japan - even hotter than usual. Not surprisingly some food items sell well when the weather is sweltering. Sports drinks, ice cream and beer come to mind, but other items as well.
One item which comes as a bit of a surprise to me is milk. I love milk and it is cold, but it is also thick. If I am really hot, I usually want to drink something a bit more watery, like a sports drink or water itself, but sales of milk are usually helped quite a bit by hot summer temperatures. Maybe people are smarter than I give them credit for and choose healthy milk over sugary drinks.
One item which comes as a bit of a surprise to me is milk. I love milk and it is cold, but it is also thick. If I am really hot, I usually want to drink something a bit more watery, like a sports drink or water itself, but sales of milk are usually helped quite a bit by hot summer temperatures. Maybe people are smarter than I give them credit for and choose healthy milk over sugary drinks.
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