What message should companies deliver in the Reiwa era? -Yo-Ho Brewing Naoyuki Ide x Euglena Akihiko Nagata

I want to solve social issues through business. What kind of communication should companies promote in order to convey their thoughts to the world?
Naoyuki Ide (nickname: Tencho), the president of Yo-Ho Brewing, which holds various fan events, including "Yona Yona Ale's Super Feast" where about 5,000 people gather, and a director of Our Akihiko Nagata, Vice President and COO, talked about "Corporate Communication of Reiwa".

V-shaped recovery by valuing communication with fans

Naoyuki Ide (Tencho): Many of our fans have come to the event today.

Akihiko Nagata (hereinafter referred to as Nagata): It's true that you can tell at a glance! Because it was a big deal, let's easily introduce ourselves to each other's companies.

Tencho: Yes. Yo-Ho Brewing is a company that makes "Yona Yona Ale". It has been 23 years since the birth of Yona Yona Ale in 1997 with the concept of authentic ale beer that can be drunk at home.

Immediately after the company was founded, it started off smoothly, but the craft beer boom ended around 1999 and it is experiencing a bottom. Since then, I have been working on various things, and now I have been increasing sales and profits for 14 consecutive years. The most important point is communication with fans. We held a small event for the first time in 2010, and we received more enthusiastic voices from our fans than we expected, and realized the significance of our existence. After that, we challenged a big event, and last year we held an event of 5,000 people in Odaiba called "Yona Yona Ale's Super Feast".

Nagata:thank you.
We, Euglena Co., Ltd., are the world's first venture company from the University of Tokyo that succeeded in mass culturing Euglena Euglena came across from the desire of President Izumo to "solve nutritional problems" in Bangladesh. It had been studied for more than 40 years and knew that it was good for the body, but no one had reached the point of mass culture. We have achieved this and are developing various products.

Currently, there are about 234,000 people who subscribe to Our I think they are really treasures for us.
So, from here on, I would like to discuss each theme together in a panel discussion format.

Tencho: I understand. Then, if you can drink it, please pick up a nice ale and have a toast!

Theme (1): What are the responses and differences you feel in the first year of Reiwa?

Nagata: In the last year, the word "SDGs" has become popular. We have been paying attention to the SDGs for about three years. Many of the colleagues and shareholders who work at Euglena share a common sense of challenge. Why work? Why buy stock in this company? I feel that the reason is moving toward solving social issues. Millennials, especially those born after 1980, tend to seek spiritual affluence rather than material affluence. When choosing a place to work, I think that products and jobs with higher social contribution will be selected from now on.

Tencho: Awareness of social issues is increasing year by year throughout the world. I also think that solving social issues is the key for companies to survive in the future. In the case of us, we are sending out the desire to make people happy through beer, and I think that is what our fans sympathize with. When you hold a fan event, people you meet for the first time can get along with each other. We value such situations and send out unique messages that major beer companies do not say.

Nagata: It is important for the company to send out a unique message. In the olden days, companies as a place to work were required to be "stable and well paid." But now, regardless of those conditions, everyone is making their own choices. The same is true for beer. I think I can now choose from the thoughts and stories on the other side of the product. Diversity in the world is spreading to both labor and consumption. That's why Yo-Ho Brewing has been continuing to increase sales and profits.

Tencho: I, Euglena I think the company's is amazing! It means that there are many people who want to support the philosophy contained in the product. It used to be a side-by-side era with few choices, but now it's interesting to choose a personality group like us.

Nagata: Can I ask you one question? It means that sales are steadily increasing, but are the number of employees increasing?

Tencho: It's increasing. There are about 140 people in total now. I'm thinking of hiring people from next year onwards. I want to increase the number of friends and realize as many things as I want to do.

Nagata: When you're doing it with 30 people and now with 140 people, do you think that the messages and advertisements you put in the product will cause your opinions to collide and something like "good luck" will be blurred?

Tencho: I feel that we are currently making efforts to prevent blurring. I'm always discussing in-house, "What's going on?" Euglena company's now, on how much of the scale?

Nagata: Over 400 people in the entire group.

Tencho: Amazing. Isn't that hard?

Nagata: The most difficult thing is that there are "people who make food" and "people who make fuel". I think some of our fans say, "Euglena," while others say, "I like this company, which is challenging new fuels." I have a lot of opinions and I have been doing M & A, so it is difficult to agree. However, as an unwavering belief, I believe that "making people healthy and solving social problems is absolutely correct." Therefore, in order to realize that, I think it is justice to pursue the growth of the company, and we also want to increase the number of friends.

Tencho: Growth is one of our themes, but we don't think we'll overtake the big players. I am seriously thinking "let's change the Japanese beer culture", and that cannot be achieved even if the company in Nagano prefecture is doing business only in Nagano prefecture. In that case, we have to take some of the Japanese beer market. It does not mean that we are aiming for No. 1 or No. 2, but that we are growing for the future we are aiming for.

Theme (2): What kind of communication are you aiming for for society and customers?

Nagata: Since Euglena Co., Ltd. is listed, it is necessary to disclose various information such as products and management structure as appropriate. In that process, I think we must continue to convey that we are seriously doing business based on our management philosophy of "healthy people and the earth." Ideally, people like Tencho and I wouldn't be screaming, "This is the direction!", But the entire organization is aiming for that direction. I think it's important to always deliver the same message, both through products and through the media.

Tencho: I'll say good things. Yeah, I think it's really important to be consistent. In the old days, communication was side by side, and employees had no choice but to follow the manuals instructed by the company. But Yo-Ho Brewing doesn't have a detailed manual. After sharing the company's way of thinking and what we value, we leave everything to us.

Nagata: That's amazing.

Tencho: Even when dealing with customers, all the people who receive emails and phone calls face each other with their own judgment and words. It's difficult because there is no manual, but I think that the way of thinking and attitude of the company dwells in such details. This may be an overstatement, but I think all of our staff are "God-friendly." Talking to any of the staff will tell you that you really like our beer and really care about your fans.

Nagata: Are the people who join the company "Yona Yona fans" at that stage?

Tencho: There are some Yona Yona fans and some company fans. By the way, when hiring, I see three requirements: "I like beer," "excellent as a business person," and "fitting our company." I used to use it if two of them were true. However, there was a pattern that didn't go well after I actually joined the company ...

Nagata: A person who "likes beer" and is "excellent as a business person"!

Tencho: That's right (laughs). No matter how good you are and you like beer, if it doesn't fit our culture, it won't work. Right now, when I joined the company, it was a good match. This is a strange word, but it may be that people who have recently arrived are more like Yo-Ho Brewing than people who have been around for a long time.

Nagata: There is. I think it's not that the old people are bad, but that the whole company is getting better at communicating themselves. And the people in the media will understand that feeling and will be able to convey it well. I think there is a virtuous cycle in which the degree of accumulation of thoughts increases steadily.

Tencho: That's true. In the old days, I didn't think it was that important. I thought, "I wish I could work because I like beer." But I started to notice it. "The culture that tries to contribute to the world through beer is the most important thing, isn't it?" No matter how good people come, the interview will ask, "We are trying to do a good job as a team, are you okay?" Then I said, "Maybe it's okay", I NG. It's not okay. I'm unhappy after I enter. Only people who say, "I want to work as a team! I want to join this team and improve the world with beer!" Are welcomed. That's why it leads to a better spiral.

Nagata: When the company was first established, everyone was a venture. At first, we are competing with originality, and at that time, people gather just because of our love for the company. However, there is an arrogant part of the manager, and as the company grows, excellent people in the market will gather and will welcome you. There may be a timing when you realize that "just adding excellent people will diminish your personality." From there, I think it is important to regain our own personality.

Theme ③: What kind of society do you want to create through the activities of the company?

Nagata: I think that increasing the number of companies that want to support such a company will lead to the happiness of humankind. I wonder if it is important to increase various things as options. Some people want to choose biofuels over petroleum fuels, while others want to choose paper-packaged products instead of plastics. I want to create a society where the diversity of people who choose is not denied.

Tencho: Our company's mission is to "taste beer! Make life happy!", But at the beginning of our founding, there was something like a rice cake drawn in a picture. However, as the number of people who drink our beer has increased, the number of people who are pleased with the encounters triggered by beer has also increased. Through my activities, I am becoming more and more aware of such things. For the past few years, I've been jokingly saying, "I'll win the Nobel Peace Prize for my ale."

Nagata:Oh!

Tencho: When it comes to beer drinking events, it's rare for people to get drunk and get into trouble, but our fan event is really peaceful and happy. If you bring this to the world, you can really make people happy and peaceful through beer. Recently, I really want to create such an era.

Nagata: For Yo-Ho Brewing, what should we pursue to get there?

Tencho: Next time, I would like to set up a vision for 20 years from now through in-house training. My idea is to be a company with the most enthusiastic fans in the world. You may not be able to beat the world's beer brands by number, but you want to be told, "It's the ale company that has the most enthusiastic fans in the world."

Nagata:Sounds good. This is what I am aiming for as an individual, but I hope that eventually it will become a world without marketing. I feel that modern people are over-instilled with the desire to "want this." More essentially, I want to think purely about "why this is necessary" so that I can choose what I really need.

Tencho: It doesn't mean that you should buy it anyway.

Nagata:Yes. There is a service called "Pocket Marche" invested by Euglena It's a model that farmers sell directly to consumers, but farmers are more than happy to say "Thank you, it was delicious" rather than increasing sales. I think that's what it's supposed to be to work. Selling one product makes someone happy. I think it is important to continue while thinking about such things.

Tencho: We were thinking about sales because we didn't know when the bottom of the era would collapse. When you opened a store on a web platform and listened directly to the voices of customers via the Internet, you first came up with the idea of "for your fans." And when I did a real event, I was so happy that my head went blank. After that, it feels like sales have come along. In the future, I would like to deliver the beer we make to the farmers who make hops. And I would like to convey the voices of the fans who are pleased. If "for someone" goes around, I think we can get better hops and make better beer.

* Honorific titles omitted in the text

Editing: Shinsuke Tada / Photo: Reiko Inada