It’s been a popular tradition in Japan to welcome the arrival of a new monarch by incorporating the nengo (era name) into a firm’s name or brand. Examples include Meidi-Ya Co., Ltd. (a confectionary firm), Taisho Pharmaceutical Co., Ltd. and Showa Shell Sekiyu K.K.
Online newspaper J-Cast News cited a survey from Tokyo Shoko Research, Ltd., which has found that Japan has 1,270 firms beginning with Heisei—the current nengo—in their names. Of these, 653 firms, or 51.4%, were established in the first nine years of Heisei, which began in January 1989. The number of firms with Showa in their name is currently 2,640—more than twice the number with Heisei. However, this is not surprising since the 62 years of the Showa era are more than double those of Heisei.
The article also points out that small individual enterprises not officially registered as firms are not included in the count of firms using Heisei.
In addition, another 143 firms that had previously existed under a different name had changed their names to include Heisei.
Broken down by prefecture, Tokyo had the largest number of firms beginning with Heisei in their name, at 139, followed by Osaka (104), Saitama (63) and Fukuoka (61). The prefecture with the fewest was Tottori, with just five.