Expert on Japan Retail and Consumer Markets, JapanConsuming

Michael Causton

Michael is co-founder and partner at JapanConsuming.

JapanConsuming is a specialist research firm producing intelligence on Japanese retail and consumer markets. Founded in 2000, JapanConsuming has become the leading provider of insights on Japanese retailers and consumer trends to retailers, brands, government agencies and investors. As well as a highly regarded monthly report on the market, JapanConsuming produces in-depth reports and seminars on retail sectors and consumer trends, as well as telephone consulting/meetings with investors. 

All of JapanConsuming's team are bilingual and bi-cultural, and the company's research sources are:

Direct meetings with retailers, wholesalers, distributors, trade body staff, govt., marketing firms, academics etc.
Govt. data
Trade association data
Trade Press across all consumer sectors
Unique Network of buyers/managers/marketing staff at retail, as well as wholesalers and trading firms.
Editors/Journalists at publishing houses and PR/Ad firms.


JapanConsuming was founded by Michael Causton and Roy Larke. 

Michael Causton set up and ran a consumer distribution business in Tokyo for 10 years and developed this into a business responsible for annual imports to Japan of several billion Yen, at the same time building up an inside knowledge of how Japanese distribution works and developing a network of contacts across the industry. Seeing the lack of quality market intelligence on Japanese markets, he co-founded JapanConsuming in 2000. He divides his time between Japan and Europe/US consulting for companies, governments and investors, including providing talks, seminars, and webinars as well as writing reports and books.

Expert on Japan Retail and Consumer Markets

Some Resistance to Cashless Payments in Japan

Z Holdings: FY19 Results Slightly Ahead of Guidance Range as Ad Revenue Growth Hits Three-Year High

Mercari – Prospects for Achieving Profitability Next Year Have Increased Significantly

Japan Payment Wars: NTT Docomo and Merpay/Origami to Attempt Catch up with PayPay and Rakuten

Mercari – Physical Stores and Data Partnerships Strengthen Ecosystem Further

Real Insight on Japanese Consumer Markets

JapanConsuming

JapanConsuming is a specialist research firm producing intelligence on Japanese retail and consumer markets. Founded in 2000, JapanConsuming has become the leading provider of insights on Japanese retailers and consumer trends to retailers, brands, government agencies and investors. As well as a highly regarded monthly report on the market, JapanConsuming produces in-depth reports on retail sectors, seminars on key trends and telephone consulting to investors on trends and retailers.

JapanConsuming was founded by Michael Causton and Roy Larke. 

Equity Bottom-Up

Last month, <a href="https://www.smartkarma.com/entities/mercari-inc" target="_blank" data-smartkarma-citation="entities:27149:1" rel="noopener">Mercari Inc (4385 JP)</a> announced a string of new initiatives to inject further momentum into its domestic CtoC business.
Mercari is often viewed as a threat by vendors and retailers of new product, although Mercari’s own survey results suggest that the ability to sell unwanted items increases the propensity to buy new ones.
Mercari will now offer its data on resales to brands and retailers to allow end-to-end tracking of a product’s lifecycle.
It also wants to incentivise Mercari users to visit stores to buy new product.
The net result should be strong collaborative ties with primary brands and retailers, helping both sides develop a compelling data set of product lifecycles from factory to second purchaser which should enhance Mercari's service levels and help it create an eco-system far more convenient and easy to use than competitors, giving it a significant advantage.
At the same time, Mercari's efforts to deepen its ties with <a href="https://www.smartkarma.com/entities/ntt-docomo-inc" target="_blank" data-smartkarma-citation="entities:1089:1" rel="noopener">NTT Docomo Inc (9437 JP)</a> could lead to Merpay merging with Docomo's payment service to create a proper third major cashless payments alternative to PayPay and <a href="https://www.smartkarma.com/entities/rakuten-inc" target="_blank" data-smartkarma-citation="entities:31:1" rel="noopener">Rakuten's (4755 JP)</a> Rakuten Pay in Japan's rapidly consolidating cashless payments race.

Last month, Mercari Inc (4385 JP) announced a string of new initiatives to inject further momentum into its domestic CtoC business.
Mercari is often viewed as a threat by vendors and retailers of new product, although Mercari’s own survey results suggest that the ability to sell unwanted items increases the propensity to buy new ones.
Mercari will now offer its data on resales to brands and retailers to allow end-to-end tracking of a product’s lifecycle.
It also wants to incentivise Mercari users to visit stores to buy new product.
The net result should be strong collaborative ties with primary brands and retailers, helping both sides develop a compelling data set of product lifecycles from factory to second purchaser which should enhance Mercari's service levels and help it create an eco-system far more convenient and easy to use than competitors, giving it a significant advantage.
At the same time, Mercari's efforts to deepen its ties with NTT Docomo Inc (9437 JP) could lead to Merpay merging with Docomo's payment service to create a proper third major cashless payments alternative to PayPay and Rakuten's (4755 JP) Rakuten Pay in Japan's rapidly consolidating cashless payments race. 

Mercari Recruits Retailers and Brands to Exploit Data & Expand Markets