Aiming for Sustainable GrowthCulture
Shiseido’s Cultural Assets
The longstanding cultural assets that Shiseido has inherited and cultivated play an important role in the Company’s endeavor to foster originality. These cultural assets have tremendous potential to enhance the attitudes and creativity of our employees.
Shiseido’s history dates back to 1872 with the establishment of Japan’s first private Western-style pharmacy in Ginza, Tokyo. Later, the Company shifted its focus to the cosmetics business, and as lifestyles and values in Japan evolved with the times, we continued to provide new beauty while closely tracking cultural developments and women’s lifestyles in each era. These initiatives included the sale of high-quality cosmetics incorporating leading Western technologies and trends as well as pioneering ideas. In this way, the Company’s sustained growth has been supported by the cultural assets that we have cultivated over more than 140 years—our approach to the art of manufacturing, our innovative ideas, and our aesthetic sense. These represent the Company’s distinctive strengths and its cultural assets.
These strengths and assets will enable us to “Be a Global Winner with Our Heritage.” Moving forward, we will pass these assets down to the employees who will create beauty in the years ahead, thereby generating new value.
Leveraging Cultural Assets as the Source of Innovation
We collect and preserve the Company’s cultural assets, such as products that we have created since our founding as well as advertising and other materials. We also conduct verification and research to ensure that these cultural assets can be effectively utilized in the years ahead. By doing so, we leverage these assets to create the future of Shiseido. Specifically, we have been conducting research to determine the “Shiseido strengths” that need to be passed down in the current operating environment, which is characterized by globalization and diversity. By proactively using Shiseido strengths in employee educational activities, we are promoting efforts to make these strengths known throughout the Company.
By communicating the history of Shiseido’s value creation, we aim to draw out brand new ideas from our employees and realize innovative output.
Examples of Specific Cultural Activities
Linking Shiseido’s Cultural Assets to Future Value
We established the Global Innovation Center (GIC) in April 2019. The GIC plays a central role for basic research and research in new categories. The S/PARK Museum is a hands-on museum located on the second floor of the GIC. This museum displays historical products of Shiseido and lets visitors experience the Company’s cutting-edge technologies firsthand. In these ways, the S/PARK Museum communicates Shiseido’s craftsmanship and awareness of beauty to the general public.
OMOTENASHI Around the World
Shiseido’s brands in the high-price range, which are recording strong growth under the Prestige First strategy, are sold principally through counseling by our beauty consultants. We have approximately 20,000 beauty consultants worldwide. As professionals, they work to master skills and knowledge regarding beauty, and they also study the approach to OMOTENASHI that is an important part of Japanese culture. While earnestly providing individual advice, beauty consultants work closely with consumers and endeavor to ensure that each one of them finds the experience to be enriching. At stores, beauty consultants explain the value of brands directly to consumers and play an indispensable role in further enhancing the presence of our brands.
Creating and Communicating “New Beauty”
Shiseido employs more than 40 hair and makeup artists. These artists are on the vanguard of beauty and fashion and play an active role in supporting, creating and communicating beauty. For example, in addition to styling hair and makeup for advertising and commercials, they also provide support for fashion shows, such as those in Paris and New York, as well as the Tokyo Collection fashion show. Our hair and makeup artists also research market trends, consumer preferences, and consumer cosmetics behavior, and they actively provide feedback inside and outside the Company. Shiseido draws on the activities of these professionals to support the development of makeup and other products, as well as to contribute to the creation of new beauty that is aligned with the times and responsive to market needs.
