In our reports for clients we spend a lot of time showcasing new and innovative digital Point of Sale (POS) systems, and how they are going to change the retail scene worldwide. Japanese innovation in area like this can be extremely infuriating because, despite amazing creations and possibilities, they seem to have a lot of trouble getting retail locations to adopt their systems. Panasonic, Fujitsu, NEC, and others have been creating amazing digital signage that works seamlessly with mobile phones using RFID, but I see very little of these products out in the real world.
This is why it was nice to see this digital POS for wine that, while simple, shows that the technology is slowly trickling out into the marketplace, though I have no idea about the extent of this outside of Japan.
Wine-centric iPhone apps like VinoforDinner should be able to easily incorporate barcode scanning into their services. Scan the code, get more info/coupons, match the perfect wine to your dinner, and keep a history of your wine shopping over time.
This RFID-based system for wine shown by our friends at Diginfo is great in a showroom, but try getting your average supermarket to adopt the system, tag their products, and then keep up the database!
We covered this RFID Wine Rack recently for an internal report, and it seems to be a pretty simple, compact solution that still uses cutting-edge technology. Shoppers scan cards representing bottles (not the bottles themselves), and explore both wines and foods available in the shop.
After making the perfect pairing, shoppers can print their recipe and go on to purchase the ingredients in-store, thus helping to push sales (especially for high-end products). It sounds simple, but just making sure that the ingredients for the suggested recipes are available is a tough enough job in itself.
We first talked about the augmented realitySekai Camera app for the iPhone a while back, but now it’s gaining momentum in a real way. The innovative app allows users to view the real world through the lens of a mobile device to bring both digital and analog life together. Below is a test video of the app in action, and you won’t be disappointed.
Tonchidot, the company that created the app, clearly has eyes on a profitable retail application. BEAMS started experimenting with in-store navigation on the iPhone in their CULTuART shop, but augmented reality would allow a deeper experience that is brought to the user, rather than initiated by the user.
Point the camera at an item and get instant information about it: No QR Codes, RFID, or complicated interfaces to navigate. The integration with GPS makes even more possible with video/audio tours, neighborhood guides, and travel in general.
Augmented reality has been the buzzword of choice of 2009 for marketers everywhere, but most of the commercial uses so far (like, around 99%) have been pretty lame, but things are looking up, at least in Japan.
What will mobile handsets look like in the next twenty years? We were lucky enough to see some futuristic prototypes on display here in Tokyo, and were blown away by the technological progress each one represents. KDDI’s Design Project has long been a forward-thinking experiment in mobile design, and this goes hand-in-hand with that spirit. Otherwise, how could we ever use our phones as drumsticks?
Down at the KDDI Designing Studio in Harajuku there’s a nice display from the design team at Daisan Matsue Elementary School in Edogawa-ku. They set out to make their perfect mobile devices and came up with some ideas that are nicely out of the box.
HIGHLIGHTS: The YS23 Baseball Phone turns into a baseball when you throw it, but that’s nothing compared to the fireproof and stylus-sporting L-109AC that enables you to fly when you push the “Fly” button. The KUMA222 sports more practical functionality with its “Home” button. According to the documentation, after pushing the button you go home. Nice!
The No123 sports a clover lucky charm so you’ll always be happy, and features a “happy camera” that makes you smile in the pictures. The phone in the middle (below) that looks like a smiley house with a cannon on it? It acts as a “warp” to teleport you from place to place.
Sounds like the Japanese kids today have pretty high demands for the future of mobile here, and I hope they aren’t disappointed, but there are a couple of points that stuck with me. First, they all pretty much stuck to the clamshell design that Japanese tend to like, and were pretty button-heavy, but at the same time they didn’t limit their handsets to “phone” features much at all. Mobile to them is about games, flying, teleporting, photos, and being happy. That, and the phones were pretty cute as well, and that might be more important than anything. More KDDI prototypes from the past can be seen HERE.
This season’s Tokyo Girls Collection took place last Saturday at Yoyogi Stadium in Harajuku, attracting around 23,100 followers of fashion. See our Spring 2009 and 2008 coverage to get catch up on the concept of the TGC.
Despite the Tokyo in the name, we discovered by chatting with the girls waiting to get in that many had come from regional areas around Japan. Nor is the word “girls” in the title entirely accurate either; now in its 9th season, the original TGC crowd is growing up, meaning with regulars and newbies together the age demographic is broadening to include kids and full-fledged adults. This year’s theme was “The Hunting,” a recession-friendly message that suggests zeroing in on the object of one’s desire (as opposed to unbridled consumerism or ceasing to shop altogether).
Girls who shop in Shinjuku (left); girls who came in from Osaka (right).
Over the years we’ve watched the TGC move from an event that showcases popular fashion brands to a platform for launching new brands in Japan—both Kitson and Nicky Hilton have given preview shows on the TGC runway. Now the event is becoming a brand in its own right. The most recent edition was as much about promoting new TGC collaboration items as it was about setting new fashion trends for the season. Said collaborations include branded stockings and beverages for Lawson convenience stores, a faux leather jacket for Uniqlo, and new cup noodle flavors for Knorr.
Tokyo Girls Collection collaboration items now on sale at Uniqlo.
When it comes to fashion the TGC has an obvious authority—being a trend-setting event about fashion—and it is now looking to parlay that authority into the ever-blurring industries of health, beauty, food, and beverage. With the Knorr noodle campaign, the TGC is playing up the concept of “bishoku” (beautiful food), which encourages girls to select healthier food and beverage options as a means to enhance inner, and thus outer, beauty. While cup-noodles might not be the healthiest staple food in the world, consumers can expect that the TGC-branded cup noodles will be at least less figure-damaging than other similar products on the market (ditto the coffee drinks). All TGC-branded goods are low calorie, stylishly packaged, and designed to suit the lifestyle of the modern urban girl (who needs coffee and a spare pair of tights to go, naturally).
Innovative cross-industry campaigns have overshadowed the TGC’s original claim to fame—that audience members can buy items off the runway with their mobile phones. Rest-assured there was still plenty of mobile fun to be had: this season featured a number of free samples, contests, and games to be experienced by swiping one’s phone on IC card readers at points around the venue. We particularly liked the promotion for the Tokyo Girls Parade, which we reported on earlier here. Event guests could pull up the site on their mobiles by scanning an IC card reader or a QR code and create their own dolled-up avatars.
Once uploaded, the fashion-forward doppelgangers could hit the runway in proper, larger-than-life TGC style on a large TV screen set up for the promotion.
We don’t usually get into politics here, mostly because, as Murray Rothbard observed, the State is nothing more than “bandit gang writ large”. Japan has been in the interesting position of being run by the same gang since the war (with a very brief exception), but the principle stands.
Luckily, we have people like Adamu at Mutantfrog and Tobias Harris to do the heavy lifting for us. With the election coming up in mere days, I figured I had to post something though. Cue Marxy and Neojaponisme for snark when needed.
We’ve been quite light on our blogging recently, but there’s just so much going on around here! First of all, we’re moving our blogging operation to JapanTrends.com in the next weeks, and then we’ll kick it up a few gears again and on a different bent.
For now, the bulk of our brain power has been pouring into the Trendpool to keep our paying clients happy. Not that we don’t love blogging for you all for free!
Project Manager Needed
In addition to the web changes, CScout Japan is now looking for a bilingual, multi-cultural fulltime Project Manager to work here in our Tokyo office in a wide variety of areas:
Managing online marketing strategy for our trading company client
Media monitoring
Street-level research
Creating client reports
Audio/Video content creation
Blogging
Working in our global trend database with our NYC and Munich offices
The ideal candidate is bilingual (Japanese and English), has had experience living/traveling globally, and is intensely curious about people and the world. For web marketing tasks it’s necessary to be comfortable with the web and keep up with trends in social networking. For other CScout projects, a keen eye and love of Japanese trends in fashion, technology, marketing, products, etc is essential. You will need to love to both read and write, and be self motivated to push us explore new areas as well.
Salary, depending on experience, can range from JPY 200,000 ~ 300,000 per month.
To inquire, please send your C.V. and details to Michael Keferl at michael(at)cscoutjapan.com. We will continue to update information about the job opening on this page.
The automated mannequins from Flower Robotics are now officially available for purchase or rental (as of June), and are beginning to make their presence known around the city. Available in two styles, full body and upper torso, the “Palette” mannequins carry sensors that can detect people around them, turn towards them, and assume appropriate positions. What’s more, they possess an “intelligent system” that records audience reactions and helps them learn over time which poses are likely to generate a positive response. “Motion design software” also allows the people in charge to design and program a specific series of poses.
Now through August 16th, one full body Palette is on display as part of the exhibition “Made by Hand: Hanae Mori and Young Artists at the Contemporary Art Gallery at Art Tower Mito. The robotic mannequin models a paper dress designed by Yuko Nishimura.
A similar mannequin was also employed to model a wedding dress at the recent Bridal Industry Fair held July 28th at Tokyo Big Site in Odaiba. Meanwhile Flower Robotics founder Tatsuya Matsui was invited to take part in Google Map’s global “Favorite Places” campaign. Click here to see his favorite Tokyo spots.
Can a mobile phone read a QR code created not digitally, but out of sand? This is a question that arose while communication “architects” Sinap Co. Ltd. were brainstorming new strategies for reaching customers in a world suffering increasingly from information overload. A QR code created by a natural substance, and one as fragile as sand, would make an impact, they thought. The question remained, would it actually be usable?
To find out, the Tokyo-based company launched the Sinap Summer 2009 Project, creating a human-scale QR code out of sand on a Shonan beach, about an hour away from the capital. The finished result, along with several “making-of” photos and a video, appear on the project website. To date, almost 400 readers have left comments regarding whether or not their mobiles could read the code; a cursory glance at the results shows that most phones could.
In addition to creating the sand QR code, Sinap is teaming up with the Nishihama Surf Lifesaving Club to promote beach cleaning efforts. According to Sinap, the efforts to break away from information noise pollution and to rid beaches of disposable lifestyle goods (plastic bags, foam trays…) are complementary endeavors.
Once again, we made it out to the Tokyo Toy Show for its 2009 incarnation (see our coverage of 2007 and 2008) and weren’t disappointed. A bit different than what we expected, but economics and other factors are changing the market a bit perhaps. Some old favorites, some new surprises, but still a fun toy show with lots to see.
What’s clear is that there’s still a huge production trend of toys that are used for cooking real food. We used to call those “appliances” back in the day, but if you make them pink, small, and plastic enough they pass as toys apparently.
Below is this year’s video round-up, with details below in the product descriptions:
Instead of just throwing in a bunch of pics like we usually do, or making separate blog entries for each product, we’ve decided to put them all together in this one big piece. Not only will you find details of the best toys from this year, but Japan Trend Shop has informed us that they’re going to be offering pre-orders for many of them. We’ll drop in the links as JTS has them ready to go. Enjoy!
I suppose it can also be a timer for real Cup Noodles, but the 3 Minute Cup Noodle Game gives you three minutes to perfectly assemble one of a variety of flavors of noodle before absolutely exploding it all into bits again.
One of our favorites. You can set up a mini golf course inside your house with Anywhere Family Golf, and play a round with the plastic golfer that looks suspiciously like teen golfing sensation Ryo Ishikawa. It even has a putter included to switch up for your short game!
We love bath goods from Japan, and if the Awa Awa Lan bubble maker can make this many bubbles for us everyday, consider us sold.
Crunchgear covered thesePellermodels pretty well here. Basically, you can print out your own figure with the faces of real people, allowing you to play dolls like Lord Helmet and create your fantasy date with, well, whoever.
Bowlingual has been around for a long time, but this new Bowlingual Voice version actually translates your dogs barks into human words and speaks them to you. No word yet on the extent of a dog’s vocabulary, but we can imagine that Japanese dogs like to talk about food alot.
These seem to be an eco toy of some kind called Cap heads. We just think they look cool.
This is another favorite. Put a coin in the dish of the Choken Bako and the dog goes wild, lapping it up until it disappears into the internal coin bank. The action is really funny to watch and is in the video above and on the JTS product page.
Clockman may not be so relevant to cultures that aren’t superstitious about blood types, but the interesting marketing angle is that they’re ties into these hugely popular blood type books we talked about here.
Eco Otome solves the problem of Japanese women who want some noise to cover up their time powdering their nose. Now, instead of flushing the toilet before going, the tiny Eco Otome makes the toilet sound for you!
Like their friend Pekoppa, Hanappa flowers are meant to be talked to, and will move along to communicate with your sentiments. Like good little Japanese flowers, they bow ever so slightly in agreement, no matter what you say. I wonder what they’re really thinking…
Soon to be released for the Homestar Extra home planetarium, these new discs are a very cool change from the usual stars.
Now that there are already a million other toys out there to help us bake different foods, the Kururin Mochi Maker eliminates the need for the gigantic wooden mallet we all imagine that mochi is actually made with.
This is one of our favorites! We love toy cameras, but the Kurorin Shot is a digital camera that lets you take all kinds of pictures with toy effects, but with the ease of digital. Quite fun to play with I might add.
No idea how this works, but the Magic Pet is low-priced, lives in old PET bottles, and does little tricks (as seen in the video).
From Tomiya, this DIY Mechanical Fish likes to swim in the water, both on the surface and under.
We LOVE Maywa Denki, the brains behind the Bacarobo competition and tons of fun, silly, and creative inventions. The Otamatone is a bit like a theremin that needs touch, and plays electronic notes. Nice design too.
Sukasama Star Japan records you saying one thing, plays it for you backwards, and then lets you attempt to do the reverse. It’s pretty funny hearing the sounds in words that you don’t realize are there (see the video for what I mean).
If you’ve never been to a kaiten sushi revolving restaurant, you might as well bring the experience home. Why go out when you can race the Sushi Train Restaurant around the table, delivering food to your family and friends? Available for pre-order here.
After talking about it here, we finally got a chance to see the Uchiage Hanabi in action, and it’s pretty amazing. We were skeptical at first, but the fireworks look pretty good in the dark. Not like the real thing of course, but still a great effect.
If you like to catch your fake food as it bounces all over your grill, the Yakiniku King is for you.
Well, that’s it for now. We’ll continue to update this piece as more product information comes in, and we have more news about where to buy these great items.
This is site is run by Sascha Endlicher, M.A., during ungodly late night hours. Wanna know more about him? Connect via Social Media by jumping to about.me/sascha.endlicher.
Girls who shop in Shinjuku (left); girls who came in from Osaka (right).
Tokyo Girls Collection collaboration items now on sale at Uniqlo.
The 
