Pan-Pacific Conference XXXIV. Designing New Business Models in Developing Economies

Sake Branding Strategy: Securing Necessary Ingredients and Attracting
Customers/Inbound Tourists through Storytelling
YongSook Lee, Shigeki Matsumoto, and Shigehito Matsubara
Human Sciences Department of Business Administration
Kansai University of International Studies, Japan
ABSTRACT
Sake consumption in Japan has gradually decreased
since the 1970s. There are many reasons for this
trend. Some of the important ones are: (1) Today a
variety of alcoholic products are available,
including many imported products that are attractive
to young professionals and female consumers (e.g.,
wine); (2) The trend of healthy life style and wellbeing
encourages less alcohol consumption; (3) The
aging population in Japan also accelerated the
downward trend of alcohol consumption; (4) The
stricter laws against driving under the influence; and
(5) The changing preference of young professionals
and female consumers for weaker or fashionable
alcoholic drinks.
In this transition process of the Sake market,
customers are emphasizing quality over quantity.
Thus, Sake producers have endeavored to produce
and market high quality Sake through careful
marketing research of changing customers' taste.
Such efforts require new Sake branding strategies.
However, to support such strategy, Sake producers
must secure specific rice, the most important
ingredient, required for producing high quality
Sake. This study investigates Sake producters
logistics efforts for securing necessary ingredients
of high quality Sake and make this process as a
differentiated strategy through storytelling to
tourists, especially overseas visitors coming to
Japan.
INTRODUCTION
Recently, not only Japan but also Korea &
Taiwan are suffering serious economy related
problems from such as population, decreasing
birthrate, economic ageing low growth, and low
interest rates. Under these adverse circumstances,
however, Japanese “inbound” tourism industry
sector alone shows remarkable growth for the last
ten years. In 2015, the number of “inbound” visitors
surpassed 19.73 million and reached 24.03 million
in 2016, which is 21.8% increase over the previous
year. Having observed this trend, on November 9th
2016, the Japanese government set up “Design
Council for tourism to make Japan brighter & richer
country” as its best card for regional revitalization
(CHIHOH-SOHSEI) and estimates its success to be
a key factor to the achievement of GDP of \600
trillion.
The council is chaired by Prime Minister Abe
assisted by chief cabinet secretary Suga as vice
chairman, consisting of 9 commissioners of
respective ministries and 7 civilians including
two designated foreigners. The council has set a
new target for reaching 40 million inbound visitors
including 24 million regular tourists until 2020, and
until 2030, 60 million including 36 million regular
tourists.
To achieve this target figure, we need to prepare
superior tourism related infrastructures. Sufficient
lodging facilities proportionate to expected inbound
tourists in number, environmental improvement in
& around tourist spots including various shops &
facilities for tourists, improvement of
communication/responding abilities to foreign
tourists in public transportation sector, enhancement
of the capacity of International Airport, and
improving the information release capabilities of
local cities/communities to outside Japan will be
issues to be addressed.
On the other hand from travel agents’ view point,
we need to observe preference variations (what are
customers’ needs?) of inbound tourists, which are
changing with the course of time and apt to be
affected by following factors; e.g. social stabilities,
social economic situations, educational levels, life
styles, and personal incomes.
Some examples of this transition can be observed
in various aspects of travel; changes from group to
individual tour, from urban to rural destinations,
from shopping to experience & knowledge oriented
tour.
As a result, travel related operators/agents begin to
evolve their new business behavior to cope with this
situation. They begin to change their marketing
behavior from “passive” tour planning to “active”
tour plannings. This is a great change from “how
can we match customers’ needs” policy to “how can
we propose experience based tour with intriguing
story (storytelling)” policy. The whole process for
materializing a new “storytelling” tour requires
active information gathering & public relations
activities, which naturally transforms them into
being positive and enthusiastic in business.
Considering the situations, we can understand that
storytelling tour is becoming a main stream to boost
the tourism industry and that finding out area
resources is indispensable for enhancing promising
customers.
In this context, it is meaningful to touch on Sake as
one of the resources because it is ranked top along
with foods among inbound travelers, travel purpose.
The fact that 71.4% of inbound travelers selected
“Foods & Sake” as travel purpose cannot be
ignored, which reminds us the universal value of an
old Japanese proverb “Dumpling rather than
Flowers.” This means that some people are more
interested in the practical over the aesthetic.
Generally, Sake has already interested many
foreigners and has been popular among them.
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