The Aroma Environmental Association of Japan, established in 2005, boasts 276 corporate members and 55,809 individual members. As reported by the Shukan Kinyobi dated 9 September, the annual market in 2015 for perfumes, which includes aromatic essences and additives for deodorisers and daily goods, came to ¥333.7bn, up 26% from the previous survey in 2011.

While aroma therapy products and services generate annual revenues of around ¥60.9bn, the market for goods that blend perfumes into products such as cosmetics, detergents and deodorisers is considerably larger, at ¥272.8bn.

Recent growth has been driven by the rapid increase in demand for “aroma cosmetics” and clothing detergent and softeners into which scent extracts have been blended. Another growth area has been aroma services, which in the past were contracted mainly by hotels. Now it’s become common for offices, medical facilities and other public places to utilise them as well, resulting in a 36% rise in such services since 2011.

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Exports to Japan by Aston Martin Lagonda Limited will be stepped up after the announcement of a £500mn UK–Japan trade and investment deal, the BBC reported on 30 August.

The five-year deal includes exports from the firm’s plants in the Vale of Glamorgan and in Warwickshire. In addition, an Aston Martin Meta Technology and Luxury Accelerator office will open in Japan in 2018.

Chief Executive Officer Dr Andy Palmer made the announcement during a visit to Japan as part of the 16-strong delegation accompanying Prime Minister Theresa May.

Glasgow cosmetics firm KiraKira Studio Limited revealed in a 25 August press release that it is launching its Japan-inspired skincare products in the UK.

The items it produces are made in Japan, and the result of the latest Japanese innovations and technologies.

“Spending many years travelling in Asia, I was inspired by the Japanese approach to beauty, but noticed that there had been no real effort to introduce their philosophies to the Western market”, said founder Renate Bergman.

PricewaterhouseCoopers Aarata LLC and Toshiba Corporation had a serious back-and-forth ahead of the release of the latter firm’s 2016 financial report, The Mainichi reported on 11 August.

PwC Aarata was under pressure to finely scrutinise Toshiba’s finances after high-profile troubles were experienced by the Japanese conglomerate’s US nuclear business. Meanwhile, Toshiba wanted to avoid an outcome that would lead to its shares being delisted.

In the end, PwC Aarata stated there were problems with Toshiba’s figures, but they did not seriously affect the business as a whole.

The largest delegation to visit the Japan International Seafood & Technology Expo from Scotland displayed their wares in Tokyo from 23 to 25 August, Seafood Source reported on 29 August.

On show was a range of Scottish mackerel, herring, crab, langoustines, as well as smoked and farmed salmon, while recipe cards were distributed to interested parties. The contingent also hosted a Taste of Scotland Seafood reception at the British Embassy Tokyo.

This is the fifth year that Scotland has hosted a pavilion at the event.

According to a survey by the Japan Tourism Agency, British tourists in Japan are staying longer and spending more money, the Nikkei Asian Review reported on 18 August.

Between April and June, tourists from the UK spent more than those from other countries. With outlays averaging ¥250,000 per person per visit, they took the top spot from China. Of the total figure, 13% was dedicated to shopping, and 72% to lodging, food and drink, and entertainment. Average stays were 14.5 days.

Total spending by international tourists reached a record ¥2.04tn for the first half of the calendar year.

According to research by drinks supplier Bibendum PLB Group, sake sales in Britain have been on the up over the past 10 years, despite declining in Japan, The Japan Times reported on  12 August.

Sales have grown 240%, as a result of the drink having come to be stocked in many restaurants, bars and supermarkets across the country. Meanwhile, UK sake breweries are beginning to emerge. Increased talk about the drink in the media also indicates that it is beginning to enter the mainstream.

The Japan Ground Self-Defense Force Central Band is the first from the country to take part in the Edinburgh Tattoo—a series of musical performances by international, domestic and Commonwealth military bands—The National reported on 11 August.

The annual showcase at Edinburgh Castle saw members invited to tour the Japanese Kyoto Friendship Garden within the grounds of the city’s Lauriston Castle. The garden was built to celebrate the twinning, in 1994, of Edinburgh and Kyoto.

Soloist Michiko Matsunaga closed the band’s performance.

In an effort to further research how to encourage more people to live in the countryside, Japanese professors embarked on a fact-finding mission with a walking group tour in the Aire Valley, Yorkshire, the Telegraph & Argus reported on 15 August.

Professors Yuko Shioji and Tatsuya Suzuki of Hannan University in Osaka were given a two-week tour of Baildon, Otley and Burley-in-Wharfedale as part of a government-funded research programme.

Japan has a declining population in the countryside and Shioji explained that they plan to set up a similar walking group in Japan.

Japanese artist Katsushika Hokusai’s famous Great Wave has made its way to a wall in south London, thanks to Camberwell resident Dominic Swords, the BBC reported on 7 August.

Swords first painted the mural in 1997 on the back of his house. But after an explosion in a drug lab in the flat underneath his home, half of the mural was burnt off. Nonetheless, within weeks the community in Camberwell had returned it to its original state.

England Rugby head coach Eddie Jones has visited Japan to search for venues and training facilities ahead of the 2019 Rugby World Cup, England Rugby reported on 11 August.

The training facilities, which are a short walk from the hotel, were described as “great”, and Jones noted the hot weather would be good preparation for the World Cup. Overall, he described Miyazaki as a “strong candidate”.

Jones and his team also visited Tokyo, Yokohama and Kobe.

An oft-said expression in Japanese is junin toiro, which literally translates as “10 people, 10 colours”. From the second half of the 1980s, it came to be increasingly used when referring to the growing trend among Japan’s consumers to crave designs in apparel, accessories, home furnishings and other possessions that differentiated them from one’s peers—a noticeable shift from the cookie-cutter conformity that had persisted for much of the post-war era.

Diversity, however, can only be taken so far, and on 31 July Nikkei Business observed a reversal of the trend that became popularised three decades ago.

It may also be a reaction to too many goods on store shelves. According to the newspaper, since 1997 the total number of items handled by the nation’s supermarkets grew 60%, from 150,000 to 233,205 last year. Of the latter number, 157,570 were food items and 75,635 were household and general goods.

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The Nikkei Marketing Journal dated 16 August reported that refinements in the types of facilities offered by shared offices have succeeded in increasing demand. These efforts are being spearheaded by two major real estate firms: Tokyo Tatemono Co., Ltd. and Mitsui Fudosan Co., Ltd.

In July, Tokyo Tatemono began offering space in an office building located in the Yaesu district of Chuo Ward, close to Tokyo Station. Named Plus Ours Yaesu, the building offers some 380m² of shared office space that has been designed to appeal to staff from regional cities who ride into Tokyo using the network of Shinkansen trains. The shared facilities include an open lounge available for a fee of ¥20,000 per month, per person or ¥2,500 on a single-day basis. Alternatively, a furnished one-room office can be leased for as little as ¥80,000 per month.

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By Mark Schreiber

The service areas (SAs) that sit beside Japan’s toll expressways can be said to have a captive audience, but that doesn’t mean they don’t go out of their way to appeal to customers. The 28 August edition of Weekly Playboy paid a visit to Kanagawa Prefecture’s Ebina SA, situated on the Tomei Expressway, which serves as the main east–west artery.

It happens to be the last stop before reaching Tokyo, or the first when leaving the capital and, thanks to its favourable location, boasts the highest sales turnover of all the nation’s SAs. On holidays, Ebina welcomes as many as 60,000 Nagoya-bound drivers and passengers per day, in addition to another 40,000 who are Tokyo bound.

Hungry travellers at Ebina SA have the option of dining at 10 different restaurants at a food section named Umai Mono Yokocho (tasty food alley). Guides aboard the many tourist buses that visit Ebina SA have been credited with promoting locally made products—such as melon-flavoured bread—sold at the souvenir concessions by announcing it to their wards before a comfort stop. The area also has access to a nearby theme park and other leisure facilities, including hot springs.

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Staff from Unilever Japan assisted with the launch of the new campaign by the Tokyo Metropolitan Government to reduce the city’s crowded trains, the Nikkei Asian Review reported 11 July.

Tokyo Governor Yuriko Koike’s Jisa Biz campaign is encouraging firms to stagger work hours to reduce crowding on peak-time trains, and Unilever is among the more than 250 firms supporting the drive. On the day of the campaign’s launch, Unilever staff handed out bottled drinks to commuters.

Last year, Unilever implemented flexible working practices, which the majority of its employees have adopted.

Nestlé S.A. will open its first factory in Japan in more than 25 years. According to a 26 July report by the BBC, the move reflects a demand for exotic flavours of the York-invented Kit Kat.

This comes as demand increases for Asia-specific flavours such as wasabi and green tea. This has resulted in a 50% growth of sales since 2010.

A focus on more expensive versions of the chocolate-covered wafer and innovative flavours has seen spending on the confection by visitors to Japan more than triple over the past four years.

Barclays Bank PLC is on a hiring spree to boost its investment banking and market operations in Japan, The Straits Times reported on 11 July.

This follows 120 job cuts and the closure of its cash equity business one year ago. Kentaro Kiso, president of Barclays Securities Japan Limited, explained that the firm is looking to hire 10 bankers and sales staff this fiscal year to advise on mergers and sell investment products.

The bank is looking to boost revenue and rebuild its Japan operations after it withdrew from the struggling stock-brokerage business last year.

British luxury fashion house Mulberry Group Plc has announced it has signed an agreement with Onward Global Fashion, its licensing partner in Japan, to set up a joint venture, the Financial Times reported on 8 July.

The new agreement gives Mulberry greater control than it had under the previous distribution agreement. It also allows the UK firm to sell its handbags and other leather goods in Japan, where the firm says it sees a “significant growth opportunity”.

Both firms have an equal stake in the venture, and are set to invest £2.8mn in the new enterprise.

Scottish confectionary firm Thomas Tunnock Limited is shipping a new product to Japan as part of a renewed bid to crack the market, the Daily Record reported on 17 July.

The firm is now pinning its hopes on the chocolate wafer cream after Japanese consumers did not take to the caramel wafer due to its sticky texture.

The firm shipped a 22-tonne container to Okinawa in June, and had arranged further deliveries for September and December.

Mitsubishi Corporation will acquire power transmission cables and substations for an offshore wind farm in the UK. It plans to spend £180 million with the UK’s HICL Infrastructure Company Limited, the Nikkei Asian Review reported on 26 July.

The transmission cables and substations will span an area of 26km between the 258MW Burbo Bank Extension wind farm and the county of Denbighshire, in north-east Wales. The firms will operate it for 20 years.

Since 2011, Mitsubishi has acquired about 900km of offshore power transmission cables across four sites in Germany and four in the UK.

Britain’s Jordanne Whiley MBE and Japan’s Yuki Kamiji won a fourth consecutive Wimbledon women’s wheelchair doubles title, the BBC reported on 16 July. They overcame Dutch players Marjolein Buis and Diede de Groot in the final.

The pair received £12,000 in prize money, and the victory followed wins at the US, Australian and French opens. The win marked a triumphant return for Whiley, who spent eight months out injured prior to the tournament.

The Welsh government Cabinet Secretary for Economy and Infrastructure Ken Skates met with Japan’s Ambassador to the UK Koji Tsuruoka and a group of airline managers in a bid to sell Wales as a holiday destination to Japanese tourists, the South Wales Argus reported on 14 July.

The two-day visit took them to a number of sites including Big Pit and Blaenavon, with a focus on the culture and heritage of Wales and the Cardiff Bay area.

Figures show that between 2013 and 2016, an average of 4,300 people from Japan visited Wales each year, generating £3mn for the country’s economy.

University of South Wales graduate Daniel Jones is travelling to Japan to become a professional wrestler, WalesOnline reported on 8 July.

The 21-year-old from Ebbw Vale, in the county borough of Blaenau Gwent, will be competing in the All Japan Pro Wrestling promotion for three months. Having begun his wrestling journey in the Welsh cathedral and university city of Newport, the film studies graduate hopes one day to wrestle for the US firm World Wrestling Entertainment, Inc.

Japan’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs has honoured James Millar with a Foreign Minister’s Commendation for his work in promoting mutual understanding between Japan and the United Kingdom with The Glover whisky, Insider.co.uk reported on 25 July.

The whisky blends Scottish and Japanese malts and is named after the celebrated “Scottish Samurai” Thomas Blake Glover (1838–1911). Millar also established the first Scottish government cross-party group on Japan, and a Japanese language group.

He co-founded Fusion Whisky Ltd in 2015, to continue developing different blends.

Loudspeaker manufacturer Kent Engineering & Foundry (KEF), was established in 1961 by the late Raymond Cooke OBE, formerly an electrical engineer at the BBC. It is now a member of the Hong Kong-based GP Acoustics Group.

As reported by the AV Watch website on 21 July, the firm has opened its first Japan showroom, the KEF Music Gallery, in Tokyo. Displaying high-performance loudspeakers, headphones and other items that appeal to audiophiles, it is open from 11:00 to 19:00, and is not far from Bic Camera’s flagship store in Yurakucho.

During fiscal 2016 (ended in March 2017), the number of convenience stores in Japan grew 2.4% year on year, to reach 57,610. According to the Nikkei Marketing Journal (NMJ) dated 26 July, overall sales for the period had grown 3.1% year on year to ¥11.19tn.

Japan’s big three chains, which account for 89.2% of all outlets, are Seven-Eleven Japan Co., Ltd. (40.4% of all outlets); FamilyMart Co., Ltd. (26.9%); and Lawson, Inc. (21.9%). Given that 50,000 outlets was once considered the nationwide limit, the market is becoming saturated, resulting in intensified competition that spills over into other retail sectors.

At the same time, the shops are diversifying and experimenting with various new products and services, which are showing beneficial results. In the words of one store manager, “Customers are staying longer in the shops. And buying patterns have changed more than we thought they would”.

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Where has expenditure gone during Japan’s summer bonus season? A survey conducted in June by the MM Research Institute found that 74% of respondents anticipated no changes from the previous year. Their main outlays were to be directed towards purchases of so-called IT–digital electric home appliances, led by smartphones and TV receivers. Those responding that plans to purchase had increased over a year ago totalled 12.1%, representing a slight rise from 2016.

The survey, conducted between May 30 and June 1, polled 1,121 adult members of the NTT Com Research service, of whom 15.3% replied their summer bonus was more than 1% above that of the previous year; 50.6% said it was more or less unchanged; and 6.4% said their bonus had declined by more than 1%.

Plans for utilising the bonus include saving or investment (61.4%), followed by purchasing products or services (37.2%). Of the latter, purchases of a car or bicycle, clothing and accessories, in addition to overseas travel and dining out, among other alternatives, all showed declines from 2016 figures, whereas the 40.4% indicating plans to purchase IT–digital-related goods were up 11.7 percentage points over the figure revealed by last year’s survey. Reduced prices for 4K high-resolution flat-screen TVs and high-performance personal computers are believed to be driving the new demand.

The survey also revealed a rise in planned expenditure on appliances related to health and beauty treatments. At the same time, outlays on items related to food preparation and appliances for home use were down.

Peterkin UK Ltd. is taking on the recent British craze for fidget spinners—flat, three-lobed toys—after having secured an exclusive licence to import the Japanese toy Mokuru to the UK market, Toy News reported on 19 June.

The Mokuru can be flipped and rolled, and purportedly tests dexterity, balance and focus, while advanced users can control multiple Mokuru at a time. Andrew Moulsher, Peterkin’s managing director, said the firm had been aware of Mokuru for some time and knew of its popularity through their Hong Kong office.

“Spinners are so last month”, said Moulsher.

The latest model in Panasonic Corporation’s Toughbook range will be produced at the company’s Petwyn factory in Cardiff, Wales Online reported on 27 June.

Panasonic expects to produce about 10,000 Toughbooks at the Petwyn site in the first 12 months. The devices will be assembled in Japan, with the final configuration for the European market carried out in Petwyn.

The model is designed for business and public-sector organisations, and is a convertible device, the screen of which can be detached from the laptop base and used as a tablet.

Tokyo is seeking to hold early trade talks with the UK in anticipation of the country’s expected withdrawal from the European single market, The Guardian reported on 26 June.

The overtures from Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe are an attempt to protect bilateral commercial ties and reinforce the strong bond the countries share at a time when Britain’s international standing might be adversely affected.

The UK is prevented by European Union rules from negotiating trade deals formally before it leaves the bloc.