The results of the 1st OCAC Taiwan Prime Awards were announced recently. The massage chair of Tokuyo Biotech Company won the gold award. Company CEO Angus Yu said that Japanese people tend to have a stereotypical impression of massage chairs so ignore the fact that they have actual physical benefits. For this reason, he makes every effort to promote massage chairs with the aim of having one in every home.
When he was young, his grandmother died of illness. In the last three years of her life she was bed-ridden. This made him feel that the happiest time of life is the healthy time, making how to extend the healthy time an important issue. He became involved in the field of medical machines, and he tried to solve this problem.
He first encountered massage chairs when he was studying in Japan when he tried out one in a public bathhouse. He said you could enjoy a relaxing massage just by putting a 100 yen coin in the machine. He thought to himself “Why not have one in every home?”
Angus received a call from the Chairman of Tokuyo Nian Chen-hsiung asking him if he’d start a massage chair business in Japan. He thought that the Japanese live the longest of any country but aging has also created various medical care problems; if massage chairs were promoted in Japan they could help people stay healthy as well as solve some health care problems, therefore he decided to promote the chairs in the Japan market.
At the time, the established impression of the Japanese of massage chairs was that they took up space and were expensive, making many people unwilling to buy and leaving a market penetration rate of just 10%. Angus said “Refrigerators are big and expensive but you will buy one to store food to avoid eating unhealthy food. Massage chairs are the same, so why not buy one? In coordination with the government, Tokuyo actively promoted massage chairs in the hope that every home can have one,
Tokuyo’s massage chairs are currently sold in 35 countries worldwide. In Japan, the business is centered on Tokuyo in Tokyo and there is also an office in Gunmaken. The main sales channels are online shopping and TV shopping channels. To meet the requirements of the Japan market, the chairs have been made smaller to make them easier to move around on daily basis. The massage chairs have also become well-known and sell 500 on average in just one hour on TV shopping channels
Angus said the most important aim of the Taiwan Prime is to promote Taiwanese brands overseas, however everyone knows that operating a brand costs money, which is why many large enterprises don’t make a special effort to operate brands overseas. Small and medium sized enterprises really need the assistance of the government. They also run their brands conscientiously and hope they government can provide help in terms of subsidy or loans.
It is often not easy for overseas brands to develop in the Japan market Angus admitted, no matter which country they are from. it’s hard to merge into the market. Unless a better and cheaper product is offered, the Japanese won’t change their allegiance. He said it’s necessary to get prepared mentally before trying to develop the Japanese market.
