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HomeAway ties up with Rakuten to better serve hosts and guests in Japan

Masaru Ikeda 2017.07.06

See the original story in Japanese. Rakuten Lifull Stay, a Rakuten Group company offering vacation rental services, and Expedia Group’s HomeAway jointly announced their partnership at a press conference in Tokyo on Monday. Rakuten Lifull Stay is a joint venture company (JV) between Rakuten (TSE:4755) and Japanese real estate giant Lifull (TSE:2120) with the aim of doing business under the Japanese Home-Sharing Business Act which will be effective January 2018. Through this new partnership, Rakuten Lifull Stay will procure and supply the properties from “hosts”, while HomeAway will attract visitors to Japan as “guests”. Rakuten Lifull Stay will supply HomeAway with domestic properties to be posted on the company’s up and coming website Vacation Stay (tentative name). HomeAway will utilize the power of their 40 million monthly website visitors to market to visitors of Japan, leading to an expansion of inbound travel demand. See also: Expedia buys HomeAway for $3.9B because Airbnb Rakuten Lifull Stay’s CEO Munekatsu Ota and HomeAway Japan’s Director Natsuko Kimura took the stage at the conference. Ota has previous experience as Rakuten International Travel’s Director and was also a general manager of Rakuten’s New Service Development Company, Sharing Economy Division. Kimura has prior work experience…

From Left: HomeAway’s Japan Head Natsuko Kimura, Rakuten Lifull Stay CEO Munekatsu Ota
Image credit: Masaru Ikeda

See the original story in Japanese.

Rakuten Lifull Stay, a Rakuten Group company offering vacation rental services, and Expedia Group’s HomeAway jointly announced their partnership at a press conference in Tokyo on Monday. Rakuten Lifull Stay is a joint venture company (JV) between Rakuten (TSE:4755) and Japanese real estate giant Lifull (TSE:2120) with the aim of doing business under the Japanese Home-Sharing Business Act which will be effective January 2018.

Through this new partnership, Rakuten Lifull Stay will procure and supply the properties from “hosts”, while HomeAway will attract visitors to Japan as “guests”. Rakuten Lifull Stay will supply HomeAway with domestic properties to be posted on the company’s up and coming website Vacation Stay (tentative name). HomeAway will utilize the power of their 40 million monthly website visitors to market to visitors of Japan, leading to an expansion of inbound travel demand.

See also:

Expedia buys HomeAway for $3.9B because Airbnb

Rakuten Lifull Stay’s CEO Munekatsu Ota and HomeAway Japan’s Director Natsuko Kimura took the stage at the conference. Ota has previous experience as Rakuten International Travel’s Director and was also a general manager of Rakuten’s New Service Development Company, Sharing Economy Division. Kimura has prior work experience as Expedia’s Marketing Director in Japan.

In the US and other countries, HomeAway specializes in renting a whole house, so it is characterized by the fact that the property is concentrated in rural and resort areas, compared to Airbnb and similar players in the same industry. Additionally, while Airbnb meets the needs of many young people traveling alone, with HomeAway the users are often middle-aged families and group travelers. It is unclear whether Rakuten Lifull Stay and HomeAway will take a similar strategy in the Japanese market, as the demand for the renting accommodations of Japan-bound visitors is concentrated in urban areas.

At the press conference, Kimura explained they are focusing on pull marketing efforts (Showing users personalized results based on their search history on the HomeAway website, driving user traffic from Google ads etc.) for urban areas such as Tokyo, Osaka and Kyoto which are in high demand of renting accommodations while they are also developing push marketing efforts that arouse demand for regions with high visibility. HomeAway introduced their promotion content for the Setouchi area facing inland sea in the western part of Japan, which it offers in 9 languages geared at 10 countries, as an example of such efforts.

In the field of vacation rentals, Airbnb is leading in sales and growth rate both in Japan and the rest of the world, and with HomeAway entering as a subsidiary of Expedia, and cooperating with other OTA (online travel agency) sites, they are actively aiming to acquire other companies in the same industry. In Japan, it can be said that this new alliance will be mutually beneficial for HomeAway, which has the urgent task of acquiring properties and hosts since they are entering the field later than their competitors, and Rakuten Lifull Stay, which needs to newly develop inbound demand from overseas.

Meanwhile, Tujia, a major Chinese vacation rental company, acquired the vacation rental service department of OTA companies Ctrip and Qunar last October. In February of this year, it was reported that Tujia will establish a Japanese corporation and enter the Japanese market in anticipation of the enforcement of Japanese Home-Sharing Business Act.

Translated by Amanda Imasaka
Edited by Masaru Ikeda

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Japanese flea market app Fril to be acquired by Rakuten: Nikkei

Takeshi Hirano 2016.09.03

See the original story in Japanese. Tokyo-based Fablic, the Japanese startup behind flea market app Fril, will be acquired by Rakuten for several billion yen (or several tens of million US dollars) and turned into an affiliate, as Nikkei reported early this morning. Combining with its own existing flea market app Rakuma, the e-commerce giant expects to grow its total trading volume up to about 3 billion yen (about $30 million). Founded in April of 2012, Fablic was born out of the 4th batch of the Open Network Lab accelerator and launched the app in September of the same year. The company introduced the concept of ‘flea market app’ for the first time in Japan. Followed by unveiling their trading volume hitting 500 million yen back in July of 2014, they secured a $10 million funding from Cookpad, Colopl and Jafco in October of said year. Fablic recently launched a new flea market app focused on trading motorcycles between individuals, called Ride, in an attempt to expand beyond fashion item peer-to-peer trading. While the app has been seeing a good growth, Mercari… another marketplace app from Japan launched in July of 2013… leapt forward and opened up a lead by…

See the original story in Japanese.

Tokyo-based Fablic, the Japanese startup behind flea market app Fril, will be acquired by Rakuten for several billion yen (or several tens of million US dollars) and turned into an affiliate, as Nikkei reported early this morning. Combining with its own existing flea market app Rakuma, the e-commerce giant expects to grow its total trading volume up to about 3 billion yen (about $30 million).

Founded in April of 2012, Fablic was born out of the 4th batch of the Open Network Lab accelerator and launched the app in September of the same year. The company introduced the concept of ‘flea market app’ for the first time in Japan. Followed by unveiling their trading volume hitting 500 million yen back in July of 2014, they secured a $10 million funding from Cookpad, Colopl and Jafco in October of said year.

Fablic recently launched a new flea market app focused on trading motorcycles between individuals, called Ride, in an attempt to expand beyond fashion item peer-to-peer trading. While the app has been seeing a good growth, Mercari… another marketplace app from Japan launched in July of 2013… leapt forward and opened up a lead by reaching 10 billion yen (about $100 million) in deals through the platform.

See also:

CNet Japan Startup Award nominees: Mobile C2C flea market apps – Fril and Mercari

We’ve contacted Fablic for comment and will update when we hear back.

Translated by Masaru Ikeda
Edited by “Tex” Pomeroy

fablic-ceo-shota-horii — Fablic founder and CEO Shota Horii

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Japanese e-commerce giant Rakuten launches $100M fund for FinTech startups worldwide

rakuten

Masaru Ikeda 2015.11.12

Japan’s e-commerce giant Rakuten announced today the launch of Rakuten FinTech Fund, which is valued at $100 million. According to the announcement, the new fund will invest in FinTech startups in London, San Francisco, New York City, and Berlin, operated by the fund’s managing partner Oskar Miel. He has been working closely with FinTech startups and Rakuten’s financial services units, having led investments in Bitnet and WePay for Rakuten. The fund was formed by and received funds from FinTech businesses under the Rakuten group, such as Rakuten Card, Rakuten Securities, Rakuten Bank, and Rakuten Life Insurance. Edited by “Tex” Pomeroy and Kurt Hanson

mikitani — Rakuten Chairman and CEO Hiroshi Mikitani

Japan’s e-commerce giant Rakuten announced today the launch of Rakuten FinTech Fund, which is valued at $100 million.

According to the announcement, the new fund will invest in FinTech startups in London, San Francisco, New York City, and Berlin, operated by the fund’s managing partner Oskar Miel. He has been working closely with FinTech startups and Rakuten’s financial services units, having led investments in Bitnet and WePay for Rakuten.

The fund was formed by and received funds from FinTech businesses under the Rakuten group, such as Rakuten Card, Rakuten Securities, Rakuten Bank, and Rakuten Life Insurance.

Edited by “Tex” Pomeroy and Kurt Hanson

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Rakuten buys Voyagin, Japan’s curated marketplace of travel activities

Takeshi Hirano 2015.07.02

See the original story in Japanese. Japanese e-commerce giant Rakuten (TSE:4755) announced today that it has taken a major stake in Voyagin, the company behind an online curated marketplace of tours and excursion activities, for an undisclosed sum. Previously known as Entertainment Kick, Voyagin was founded in December of 2012. The company has been offering a C2C (consumer-to-consumer) online marketplace connecting local guides (hosts) and travelers so that travelers can find and buy tour plans arranged by local guides. Available in English, Japanese, Chinese, and French, the marketplace is listing about 1,800 tour plans from 50 countries, mainly in Asia. What makes the startup unique from other similar websites is they interview local guides face-to-face or over Skype to assure service quality before approving them as hosts. In 2013, the company graduated from the sixth batch of Open Network Lab, a Tokyo-based startup accelerator. Upon the acquisition by Rakuten, Voyagin CEO Masashi Takahashi said his team will expand business targeting tourist coming to Japan: I think that a peak of the inbound tourism industry will come up in 2020 because of the Tokyo Olympics games. To make the best platform as soon as possible towards the opportunity, we decided to…

See the original story in Japanese.

Japanese e-commerce giant Rakuten (TSE:4755) announced today that it has taken a major stake in Voyagin, the company behind an online curated marketplace of tours and excursion activities, for an undisclosed sum.

Previously known as Entertainment Kick, Voyagin was founded in December of 2012. The company has been offering a C2C (consumer-to-consumer) online marketplace connecting local guides (hosts) and travelers so that travelers can find and buy tour plans arranged by local guides. Available in English, Japanese, Chinese, and French, the marketplace is listing about 1,800 tour plans from 50 countries, mainly in Asia. What makes the startup unique from other similar websites is they interview local guides face-to-face or over Skype to assure service quality before approving them as hosts. In 2013, the company graduated from the sixth batch of Open Network Lab, a Tokyo-based startup accelerator.

Upon the acquisition by Rakuten, Voyagin CEO Masashi Takahashi said his team will expand business targeting tourist coming to Japan:

I think that a peak of the inbound tourism industry will come up in 2020 because of the Tokyo Olympics games. To make the best platform as soon as possible towards the opportunity, we decided to partner with Rakuten, which would be the best choice for us.

We are currently more focused on offering tours in Japan and Bali (Indonesia), creating successful models of typical different tour plans for city visitors and vacation goers.

Rakuten has a travel-booking site called Rakuten Travel, listing about 30,000 hotels in Japan. Combined with the stock of these hotel room availabilities, Voyagin will be able to create a variety of tour plan products for foreign visitors to Japan. According to Takhashi, their revenue grew tenfold on a year-on-year basis and transacted bookings for 30,000 users last year.

Known as a C2C business model connecting individuals, the marketplace also has an aspect of giving marketing channels for small tour planning companies, and these professional businesses have contributed to Voyagin in making revenue.

The Voyagin team consists of about 20 people including part-time workers, and half of them are foreign staffers. Based in Bali and Singapore, as well as Tokyo, they have been operating business leveraging teleconferences using Skype. Most users visit the marketplace from outside Japan, which gives the impression that Voyagin is a Japanese startup succeeding in the global market.

In this space, we’ve seen Japanese leisure booking site Asoview secured a partnership with travel giant JTB Group in April, aiming to expand the business in the inbound tourism industry. It will be interesting to see how the JTB-Asoview alliance will compete with the Rakuten-Voyagin partnership.

Translated by Masaru Ikeda
Edted by Kurt Hanson

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Rakuten announces acquisition of VoIP and messaging app company Viber

Masaru Ikeda 2014.02.14

Japanese e-commerce giant Rakuten held a business strategy briefing today, unveiling that it has acquired VoIP and messaging app company Viber for $900 million. Viber has acquired over 300 million users worldwide, with 550,000 new users signing up every day. And Rakuten’s founder and CEO Hiroshi Mikitani expects to bring much of that user base to Rakuten’s e-commerce business, which already has 200 million users worldwide. To commemorate the acquisition, the two companies started a promotion that lets users worldwide to make a call to any landline phones in Japan for free.

Japanese e-commerce giant Rakuten held a business strategy briefing today, unveiling that it has acquired VoIP and messaging app company Viber for $900 million.

Viber has acquired over 300 million users worldwide, with 550,000 new users signing up every day. And Rakuten’s founder and CEO Hiroshi Mikitani expects to bring much of that user base to Rakuten’s e-commerce business, which already has 200 million users worldwide.

To commemorate the acquisition, the two companies started a promotion that lets users worldwide to make a call to any landline phones in Japan for free.

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Shopping points service Smapo joins forces with Rakuten

Yukari Mitsuhashi 2013.10.15

Back in Feburary, we wrote about Smapo, the Japanese equivalent of Shopkick. Today, the company announced that it has joined Rakuten group, giving it access to Rakuten’s 80 million+ members. Smapo was initially launched back in September of 2011. By checking into physical stores, users receive points (one point is worth one yen), which can be exchanged to rewards such as gift certificates and dinner tickets. Smapo can be used at over 700 participating stores and over 90 brands. Stores are required to pay comission on a pay-per-performance basis. Joining the Rakuten family will empower Smapo to expand its partnerships with stores. As we wrote in a previous article, what differentiates Smapo from its US counterpart is that it uses a sort of inaudible audio signal to detect users walking in, via the required in-store hardware which is about the size of a matchbox. There are many tech companies trying to tackle the same O2O market, such as Showcase Gig. But the type of technology leveraged by Smapo is a notable advantage. Yo Shibata, the CEO of Spotlight (the company behind Smapo), elaborates on the new partnership with Rakuten: Smapo began under the mission of bringing surprises and discoveries to…

Back in Feburary, we wrote about Smapo, the Japanese equivalent of Shopkick. Today, the company announced that it has joined Rakuten group, giving it access to Rakuten’s 80 million+ members.

Smapo was initially launched back in September of 2011. By checking into physical stores, users receive points (one point is worth one yen), which can be exchanged to rewards such as gift certificates and dinner tickets. Smapo can be used at over 700 participating stores and over 90 brands. Stores are required to pay comission on a pay-per-performance basis.

Joining the Rakuten family will empower Smapo to expand its partnerships with stores.

As we wrote in a previous article, what differentiates Smapo from its US counterpart is that it uses a sort of inaudible audio signal to detect users walking in, via the required in-store hardware which is about the size of a matchbox. There are many tech companies trying to tackle the same O2O market, such as Showcase Gig. But the type of technology leveraged by Smapo is a notable advantage.

Yo Shibata, the CEO of Spotlight (the company behind Smapo), elaborates on the new partnership with Rakuten:

Smapo began under the mission of bringing surprises and discoveries to people’s everyday shopping experience. As the very first smarphone-based points service, we have accomplished to tremendous growth in the past two years. The spread of smartphones is truly changing the way we shop. By becoming a part of the Rakuten group, Spotlight, will continue to innovate on people’s shopping experiences.

Smapo is available for download on both iOS and Android.

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Two young Japanese entrepreneurs discuss their recent buyouts

Takeshi Hirano 2013.10.15

See the original story in Japanese. This is a part of our coverage of B Dash Camp Osaka 2013. Two Japanese startups that have experienced an strong growth in the last several months are Coach United, the startup behind private lesson portal Cyta.jp, and Bracket, which operates instant e-commerce platform STORES.jp. On day two of B Dash Camp Osaka last week, we had a chance to hear from Coach United CEO Nobuhiro Ariyasu and Bracket CEO Yusuke Mitsumoto. Also on the panel were Rakuten executive officer Takeshi Homma, and KDDI general manager Shigeki Matsuno. This year Ariyasu sold his startup to Japanese recipe site Cookpad, and Mitsumoto sold his startup to leading Japanese fashion commerce company Start Today. Moderator Hiroyuki Watanabe started the sessions with asking about their recent exits. When did you start preparing for buyouts? Ariyasu explained: When we launched our company back in 2007, I had no idea about funding or M&As. We couldn’t help but enjoy developing our product at that time. Two or three years later, we finally could make our business profitable, and had a chance to receive offers from some people [1]. The company kept using bank loans but were exploring funding opportunities…

bracket-fril — Bracket CEO Yusuke Mitsumoto and Coach United CEO Nobuhiro Ariyasu

See the original story in Japanese.

This is a part of our coverage of B Dash Camp Osaka 2013.

Two Japanese startups that have experienced an strong growth in the last several months are Coach United, the startup behind private lesson portal Cyta.jp, and Bracket, which operates instant e-commerce platform STORES.jp. On day two of B Dash Camp Osaka last week, we had a chance to hear from Coach United CEO Nobuhiro Ariyasu and Bracket CEO Yusuke Mitsumoto. Also on the panel were Rakuten executive officer Takeshi Homma, and KDDI general manager Shigeki Matsuno.

This year Ariyasu sold his startup to Japanese recipe site Cookpad, and Mitsumoto sold his startup to leading Japanese fashion commerce company Start Today. Moderator Hiroyuki Watanabe started the sessions with asking about their recent exits.

When did you start preparing for buyouts?

Ariyasu explained:

When we launched our company back in 2007, I had no idea about funding or M&As. We couldn’t help but enjoy developing our product at that time. Two or three years later, we finally could make our business profitable, and had a chance to receive offers from some people ^[1].

The company kept using bank loans but were exploring funding opportunities for the next stretch.

Bracket is not an old company but has been running a number of businesses for about five years. In contrast to his past businesses, Mitsumoto was aggressively exploring funding opportunities to boost their e-commerce platform. He attributes this to the many competitors in that space ^[2].

What’s the most impressed in the entire session was the following interaction between the pair.

Ariyasu asked Mitsumoto,

If Base (Bracket’s main competitor) wasn’t around, would you still sell your startup to Startup Today?

Mitsumoto answered, saying:

Without them, we probably might have not achieved the revenue we have.

Why not aim for an IPO?

Since these two startups were rapidly growing but self-funded, their founders could probably consider IPOs as possible options. But they emphasized a good match with the companies that acquired them.

Ariyasu explains:

I’m not really a person who drives after an IPO. It’s all up to you to determine whether an IPO and an M&A is a better choice for you. … I actually got an offer from Murakami (Livesense CEO) but I think it was not so aggressive. I’m close with him, and we have been fishing together. The reason why we partnered with Cookpad was I thought the both companies have something common in their corporate culture.

In a explanation about how Bracket’s Mitsumoto decided to sell his startup, he unveiled it was finally decided over the phone with Start Today’s CEO Yusaku Maezawa, which surprised the audience.

bdash-camp-buyout-mitsumoto — Bracket CEO Yusuke Mitsumoto

The decision was surprisingly smooth. I’ve been in touch with Maezawa for almost three years since he sent us an inquiry via our website. … I’ve handled four different businesses in the past, and I finally managed to find success in my fifth. The recent announcement that Yahoo Japan made of making its e-commerce platform free this year will be a big turning point in the Japanese e-commerce industry, where more players will make more bold decisions to defeat competitors.

Buyer’s perspective, seller’s perspective

KDDI’s Matsuno was involved in Mediba’s ^[3] acquisitions of startups such as Nobot and Scaleout. In a response to moderator Watanabe’s question about criteria around M&As, he says:

You probably need the perspectives of both a buyer and a seller. When your company is acquired by 100%, you will totally lose your ownership. In an extreme case, you might lose your position as the CEO. When you think of a company that you could sell your business to, you will need to build a good relationship of mutual trust (not to be asked to step down).

Rakuten’s Homma concluded the session with saying that:

Both for a seller and a buyer, the more experience you have, the better you can understand how you should proceed.

We previously featured Ariyasu and Cyta in this article.↩
Our readers may recall that we visited the Bracket office just last month, and had a chance to speak more with Mitsumoto about Stores.jp.)↩
Mediba is a mobile advertising-focused subsidiary of KDDI.↩

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Rakuten Marketing picks up Seattle-based affiliate aggregator PopShops

Rick Martin 2013.08.14

This week Rakuten Marketing, a New York-headquartered arm of Japanese e-commerce giant Rakuten, acquired PopShops, an affiliate product feed aggregator founded back in 2006. Terms of the deal were not disclosed. PopShops serves up-to-date information on retail products from affiliate programs like Commission Junction, Avant Link, eBay, and Amazon. And Rakuten Marketing noted in its announcement that such feeds are “a fundamental part of e-commerce.” Rakuten Marketing already had a relationship with Seattle-based PopShops via Rakuten LinkShare, as the technology was already integrated into the latter’s affiliate marketing network. With this acquisition, clients can still opt for another feed technology if they choose. Now known as ‘Rakuten PopShops’ (logo below), the acquired service will now be housed under the Rakuten Markering umbrella, right along side Rakuten LinkShare and Rakuten Mediaforge. PopShop employees will remain in the company’s Seattle headquarters.

This week Rakuten Marketing, a New York-headquartered arm of Japanese e-commerce giant Rakuten, acquired PopShops, an affiliate product feed aggregator founded back in 2006. Terms of the deal were not disclosed.

PopShops serves up-to-date information on retail products from affiliate programs like Commission Junction, Avant Link, eBay, and Amazon. And Rakuten Marketing noted in its announcement that such feeds are “a fundamental part of e-commerce.”

Rakuten Marketing already had a relationship with Seattle-based PopShops via Rakuten LinkShare, as the technology was already integrated into the latter’s affiliate marketing network. With this acquisition, clients can still opt for another feed technology if they choose.

Now known as ‘Rakuten PopShops’ (logo below), the acquired service will now be housed under the Rakuten Markering umbrella, right along side Rakuten LinkShare and Rakuten Mediaforge. PopShop employees will remain in the company’s Seattle headquarters.

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4 creative online marketing campaigns from Japan

Yukari Mitsuhashi 2013.08.02

Yesterday we wrote about how Japanese beverage company Suntory is leveraging Facebook to collect user feedback to develop new products. Many other Japanese companies are using online tools in interesting ways as well. And here is a short list of a few of the more creative examples we have found. 1. Build your own ice cream cake ¶ Suica card is an IC card that many Japanese people use for payments on their commute. View Card, the company behind these pass cards, has collaborated with Lotte Ice for a one-day promotion. Recently, there was a Twitter campaign where users combine 18 Suica Bar watermelon slice popsicles to create a whole watermelon 1. On July 27th View Card gave consumers who signed up for a Suica card (with a credit card feature) 18 popsicles to create this unique ice cream cake (see photo below). 2. A year’s worth of burgers ¶ Mos Burger is a popular hamburger franchise in Japan. The company differentiates itself from other fast food chains with its made-after-order fresh food. Beginning on August 1st, the company started a Twitter/Facebook photo contest asking people to post photos that make them smile. Winners will receive various awards, including a…

Yesterday we wrote about how Japanese beverage company Suntory is leveraging Facebook to collect user feedback to develop new products. Many other Japanese companies are using online tools in interesting ways as well. And here is a short list of a few of the more creative examples we have found.

1. Build your own ice cream cake ¶

Suica card is an IC card that many Japanese people use for payments on their commute. View Card, the company behind these pass cards, has collaborated with Lotte Ice for a one-day promotion. Recently, there was a Twitter campaign where users combine 18 Suica Bar watermelon slice popsicles to create a whole watermelon ¹. On July 27th View Card gave consumers who signed up for a Suica card (with a credit card feature) 18 popsicles to create this unique ice cream cake (see photo below).

2. A year’s worth of burgers ¶

Mos Burger is a popular hamburger franchise in Japan. The company differentiates itself from other fast food chains with its made-after-order fresh food. Beginning on August 1st, the company started a Twitter/Facebook photo contest asking people to post photos that make them smile. Winners will receive various awards, including a Mos Card which you can use to buy a year’s worth of Mos Burgers (a signature burger at the franchise). 320 yen per burger times 365 days would total 116,800 yen (or about $1,175) worth. Not bad!

3. A life supply of snack bars ¶

This is a campaign currently being held on Japan’s biggest online mall, Rakuten, asking consumers to decide on their favorite two snacks. If you were to chose one snack for the rest of your life, which one would it be? The two snacks competing are both a very popular among Japanese people: Happy Turn and Umaibo. In fact, Umaibo is so popular that there are even Umaibo mobile games. Anyone who has liked the Rakuten Facebook page can participate, and one winner will be chosen for each snack. For a bag of Happy Turn, the appropriate consumption per month according to the manufacturer is three bags, so the winner will receive 3,600 bags, or enough to last for 100 years.

4. More heat, more money! ¶

Georgia Coffee is manufactured by Coca Cola Japan, and the brand recently held a campaign on Twitter, awarding a daily winner with a cash prize and a box of Georgia coffee. The company launched a special website where it posts Georgia- and summer-related topics per day, such as ‘What words would you use to toast with a super cold can of Georgia?’ The amount of cash awarded is decided by the hottest recorded temperature in Japan that day, with 10,000 yen being awarded for every additional degree over 30 degrees celcius. So if the hottest temperature is 36.6 degrees, the winner will receive 70,000 yen (or $700).

‘Suica’ means watermelon in Japanese, and this is a popsicle that takes the shape of a watermelon slice. ↩

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In Japan, internet companies make weddings more affordable

SCORE 1,322

Yukari Mitsuhashi 2013.05.16

It can be hard to make Japanese weddings unique or special, since so many of them are held in the same kind of reception rooms in hotels or typical wedding venues. It’s not uncommon for couples about to be married to flip through wedding magazines like Recruit’s Zexy agonizing over the details of their ceremony. But recently we’re seeing newcomers who challenge the conventional ways of organizing weddings. Amazon just opened up its own sort of wedding store, which can be helpful for couples who might have little time to prepare for a wedding. Rakukon operated by Best Bridal, where couples can pay only 200,000 yen for their wedding in advance (about $1,957) and then pay the rest with congratulatory gift money (Goshuugi). This way, couples do not have to pay out of their own pocket. Rakukon’s pricing is unconventional considering that on average couples spend over 3 million yen on a wedding (about $29,355). Making it affordable Perhaps the biggest game changer in the wedding industry is Minna no Wedding (roughly be translated as ‘Everyone’s Wedding’) which launched back in Feburary of 2008. The service was originally a DeNA offering, but it was split from that company in October of 2010….

minna-no-wedding — *Minna no Wedding* has made weddings affordable for many in Japan

It can be hard to make Japanese weddings unique or special, since so many of them are held in the same kind of reception rooms in hotels or typical wedding venues. It’s not uncommon for couples about to be married to flip through wedding magazines like Recruit’s Zexy agonizing over the details of their ceremony.

But recently we’re seeing newcomers who challenge the conventional ways of organizing weddings. Amazon just opened up its own sort of wedding store, which can be helpful for couples who might have little time to prepare for a wedding. Rakukon operated by Best Bridal, where couples can pay only 200,000 yen for their wedding in advance (about $1,957) and then pay the rest with congratulatory gift money (Goshuugi). This way, couples do not have to pay out of their own pocket. Rakukon’s pricing is unconventional considering that on average couples spend over 3 million yen on a wedding (about $29,355).

Making it affordable

Perhaps the biggest game changer in the wedding industry is Minna no Wedding (roughly be translated as ‘Everyone’s Wedding’) which launched back in Feburary of 2008. The service was originally a DeNA offering, but it was split from that company in October of 2010. The site has about one million unique users and 10 million page views per month. This count is very impressive considering that visitors to the site are limited to couples planning to marry.

Minna no Wedding’s killer content — and what differentiates it from competitors — are the wedding venue reviews posted by couples after they marry. Previously, all wedding-related information was pretty favorable when describing venues, since the venues were the ones paying to be published. People post reviews for many reasons, but many do so share the excitement (or disappointment in some cases) of their wedding. There is also an incentive system called Goshuugi points where posting three reviews can be rewarded with over 1,000 yen (about $10) worth of points.

By reading genuine opinions and reviews about venues, the likelihood of a successful wedding is obviously much higher. Reviews must be detailed, though, and are required to be more than 300 characters.

Another interesting feature of Minna no Wedding is the bill statement. Couples are sometimes surprised by the difference in the initial estimate and the final cost as venues try to recommend additional options in the preparatory process. Since the actual statements are online, it helps to remove some anxiety for couples.

According to Nikkei, the number of marriages in Japan was about 700,000 in 2010, which is 36% lower than back in 1972 when we experienced the second wave of baby boom. Among those who get married, only 300,000 to 350,000 couples celebrate by having a wedding ceremony. For the rest of the couples who opt to skip the ceremony, Minna no Wedding offers an attractive service that might change their minds.

To see how the website works, check out the video below.

rakuten

HomeAway ties up with Rakuten to better serve hosts and guests in Japan

Japanese flea market app Fril to be acquired by Rakuten: Nikkei

Japanese e-commerce giant Rakuten launches $100M fund for FinTech startups worldwide

Rakuten buys Voyagin, Japan’s curated marketplace of travel activities

Rakuten announces acquisition of VoIP and messaging app company Viber

Shopping points service Smapo joins forces with Rakuten