I never expected that the article I wrote on the Japanese pancake company would go viral. And while digging for sources for Janice who asked about them in the comments section of the earlier post, I accidentally dug out more dirt.
I first came to hear about the scheduled opening in Vivo City when a friend pointed me to this post by Ladyironchef below. I didn’t want to respond to it since the case has more or less blown over in Japan for quite some time now. Little did I know, somebody shared my article there and the next moment I know, I started receiving comments and messages on the credibility of my article and the sources I got them from.
I tried searching for similar articles in English but couldn’t find much. However, there are tons of articles in Japanese, meaning this unethical practice is pretty much contained within Japan.
When I received the first message regarding the article, I immediately went to look at my site stats and saw that the page views jumped by almost 2000%. Talk about the power of the Internet. Since this is pretty huge news in Singapore now, I see it fit to provide more information on how the case transcended.
The incident first surfaced when fans of the original The Tiramisu Hero flared up after the Singapore duo published on their Japan website that they couldn’t use their brand in Japan. This news got caught by the national broadcast media.
After the TV started talking about it, people began digging behind the issues and discovered that the company behind it was the same person running Gram. Things then got juicy when they learned that Gram was originally an Osaka cafe later made to change their name to Bran cafe after suffering the same fate as The Tiramisu Hero. Bran cafe eventually shut down but Gram came out to deny those claims on their website.
Some time later, things got even messier when it was revealed that The Tiramisu Hero actually stole the work of artist Gemma Correll for their logo. The cafe issued an apology and admitted that they made reference to Gemma’s work as they were fans of her drawings. It unfortunately came out looking pretty much like an exact copy of her work. The original The Tiramisu Hero has since promised to gradually phase out her cat drawings on their wall and merchandise and replace with more original ones. Despite that, the negative publicity caused the Japanese public to boycott both the copied Tiramisu Hero’s cafe and Gram.
You’d think the story ends here but there’s more exciting story to Bran cafe. Turns out, the company that runs Bran cafe also runs unethical businesses through “pressure buying.” As you understand, “pressure selling” is forcing people to buy your stuff. “Pressure buying” is forcing people to sell their stuff. What the company did was to go to homes of elderly people and force them to sell their precious metals. The company pulled some 1.1 billion yen (approx. SGD $13.5 million ) in profit but hid it from the tax office. When caught, they were hit with an additional 600 million yen (approx. SGD $7.3 million) of tax and because they weren’t able to pay it off, the company filed for bankruptcy.
Ah well, so it appears that all the parties involved in this story are also involved in some kind of mischief themselves. Who can you really trust nowadays, huh?
For the benefit of those who didn’t read the comments section of the original article, here are some of the sources you can refer to (most of which are in Japanese):
1) Japan Times article
https://www.japantimes.co.jp/news/2019/02/02/national/media-national/tiramisu-copyright-furor-highlights-internets-importance/#.XMKZSjD7SM8
2) Official notice from the Singapore Tiramisu Hero that they are unable to use their original brand name in Japan resulting in their decision to move to new site
https://thetiramisuherojapan.com/%E5%87%BA%E5%BA%97%E3%81%AE%E3%81%8A%E3%81%97%E3%82%89%E3%81%9B/
3) Official apology from the Japanese company to give the original Singapore company the right to use the logo
https://www.hero-s.net/contents/98/
4) Article on Gram’s patent and trademark applications
https://rocketnews24.com/2019/01/22/1166831/
5) Article on Bran company’s downfall
https://www.sankei.com/west/news/180913/wst1809130076-n1.html
Japan has historically been known to be a nation that modernize quickly. After being forced to open up to Western powers in 1852, it undergo a revolution with the Emperor regaining power in 1868. All Singaporeans know that Singapore was invaded by the Japanese in 1942, defeating the almighty British empire where Singapore was famously known as the Gibraltar of the East. So we know that in about 80 years, Japan modernize from a feudal nation to one of the world powers capable of standing toe-to-toe with Western nations (Think Russo-Japanese war).
So why do so many expats criticize Modern 21st Century Japan as a slow country? For example, still using fax. In fact, since you are talking about the scandal, there was a recent scandal whereby the prestigious Tokyo University deliberately reduce the entrance points of women in favor of less-qualified males into its medical school.
Now, we all know that Japan has an ageing population, and there is a labour shortage whereby there are about 160 jobs per 100 applicants. The unemployment rate has also fallen to about 2.3%. Sure, the top companies still face competition, but I read in an article that SMEs are competing among each other for applicants.
Abe Shinzo has also announced Womenomics(as part of its Abenomics) last year, trying to encourage more women to continue their careers after having a family. If you had read Lee Kuan Yew’s One Man View of the World, you would have saw under his Japanese section that the Japanese race must be kept pure (half-japanese are not recognized as full japanese unless they win a tournament, like Naomi Osaka). Of course if you are a half white half japanese you are the subject of envy, but that’s another topic altogether.
So it comes naturally that Womenomics policy is introduced to address the labour shortage and ageing population problem first before thinking about accepting foreign immigrants. But since Japan society moves so slowly (well, still using fax), nothing much has changed so this prompted Abe Shinzo to turn to considering accepting foreign immigrants as seen in his policy last december. Of course, low-skilled immigrants are only given a visa of up to 5 years max while high-skilled immigrants get opportunity to renew and have chance of converting to permanent resident.
I have followed your blog for a long time, so there are 2 questions I would like to ask you, since you have lived in Japan for almost 10 years now (you took your N1 in 2010)
1) Why is it that Modern Japanese Society moves so slowly? Why is it still using fax? In its not so-long ago history, we saw how it modernize rapidly such that it was able to beat China (treaty of shimonoseki, where it controlled Taiwan for 50 years), annexed Korea (1910-1945), and conquer most of Southeast Asia by beating Britain, the top world power at the time. I dare say they may have won the war had they not made the folly of attacking America (Pearl Harbour), since before that the American public was quite against war.
2) Abe Shinzo’s 2 policies, Womenomics and Immigration, how far-reaching has their impact been so far? Given that you lived in Japan. I assume the effects are slow-moving? That Prime Minister Abe Shinzo is only introducing them for the sake of it and not really setting legal quotas to speed things up.
Reason why I am asking is because I am a Japanophile, currently a second year student at SMU, plan to do an exchange at Keio University in Japan next year, have studied Japanese for 3 years, been to Japan 5 times on holidays, got JLPT N3, watches anime, read wikipedia widely on japan in culture, history aspects, etc, and might want to work in Japan when I graduate. So naturally, I want to maximize my chances of getting a job there which does not involve me having to work long hours, and take part in quite many of its work traditions (such as drinking together after work) which can be done with.
Anyway, I congratulate you that the Japanese emperor is stepping down next Wednesday (1st May) to make way for the new era, Reiwa. Since the birthday of Japanese emperor is a holiday in Japan, that means you get another day of Holiday. But then again, you work freelance, so this probably doesn’t apply, but does for your Girlfriend, dirtyshoes.
Hi fivebx,
That was one long comment and very difficult questions for me to respond as a comment. If I were still in uni, that could possibly be a term paper in itself. Regarding the two questions you raised:
1) I’ve asked some companies why they still use fax and it appears that, many of these companies using fax have a significant number of their clients mostly with staff in their 40s and up. They may not necessarily have tech phobia, but using fax is quick and easy for them. Compared to typing, they can just write on a piece of paper, dial a fax number, much like using the phone, and whatever they need gets delivered. There’s no need to boot up the computer, launch the browser, login to their email, stare at the QWERTY keyboard and type using letters that do not belong to the alphabet of their language. And if you think about it, fax is similar to email as an asynchronous medium of communication.
2) I haven’t been following the Womenomics and immigration issues fervently, so my opinions here may not hold very well. While growing slowly, there seems to be visible changes in the society with regard to women working, especially in the tech industry among newer companies and startups. I think it’s only fair that things move slowly. After all, it is hard to expect deeply inculcated perceptions to suddenly change overnight. India’s thousand-year-old caste system was abolished in 1950, but the concept still remains for the last many decades. Have you ever wondered why so many Indians are in to IT? Yes, they are good at math, but I suspect the main reason is because IT is a very new industry that only existed after the caste system was abolished. This means, the job wasn’t assigned to any caste, so anyone could learn it and that was the key to breaking out of poverty. I also find it reasonable for a nation to first utilize its own (labor) resources before looking outside, so it is logical that the government wants to get more women back into the work force. I’m not sure if there’s been any legal quota to speed things up, but I believe there are many social issues involved as well because I have many female friends who say they want to get married soon just so they can stop working. In this case, it’s not just about whether women can return to work but also about whether women want to return to work. Many I know do work after marriage, but a good number also only do part-time work. Further, the lack of childcare centers also make it difficult for both parents to do so especially since it is very common for people to have family members living far away in other prefectures, so they are unable to get their parents to look after their children. It’s just a very difficult issue to fully resolve within the span of a Prime Minister’s reign.
Last, I do not understand the congratulatory message on the emperor stepping down. You make it sound like I want the current emperor to step down lol. I do not have any vested interest in who the emperor is, so the change of era doesn’t have significant bearing on me but if you are referring to the birthday holiday, then unfortunately, it’s not happening. Reason being, the current emperor’s birthday is in December, which means there will be no holiday since he will no longer be the emperor by then. The new emperor’s birthday is in February, so there’s also no holiday since he wasn’t the emperor yet on his birthday. But we did get extra holiday for the coronation during the Golden Week this year, so it’s 10 straight days of holiday for people. Again, as you already know, this doesn’t affect me at all since I still have to work lol.
Hi Gaijinhan,
Thank you for your lengthy reply. I am sorry if my questions were too difficult for you, but anyway I lol’ed at your “term paper” comment.
1) Fax was only an example, the main context was why do Japan moves so slowly, in terms of advancing slowly as a society (like you said, still many social issues), in terms of politics, in terms of technological advancements (fax, for instance), you get what I mean. And this is against a backdrop of a nation who traditionally had transformed itself from a feudal nation to a world power in the span of 80 years.
2) If you have read LKY’s One Man View of the World, you would realize that Japan does NOT have the luxury of waiting for these “deeply inculcated perceptions” to change slowly. I quote you a text from his book: “It will take many more years and a very fundamental shift in attitudes for the country to contemplate a demographic solution that is based on attracting immigrants. But does Japan have the luxury of waiting many more years before confronting this problem? I doubt it. If they leave it for another 10 to 15 years, they would have gone down the slippery slope, and it may be too late to recover.” From the book, it is also mentioned that the number of workers supporting each senior person has shrunk from 10 in 1950 to 2.8 in recent years, due to the low fertility rate. By the way, the book was launched in 2013. I think legal processes are necessary to speed things up. Yes, I agree with your statement on utilizing women as a labor resource and allowing women back into the workforce, but you yourself also realize there are a lack of social support here in Japan (this is again substantiated in LKY’s book). Interesting analysis of the IT sector in India btw.
Regarding the congratulatory message, nah there was no implicit message in it. From what I heard from my Japanese teacher, the holiday remains even if the emperor is no longer emperor (I think Hirohito’s birthday is still an annual holiday?). And from what I know, the birthday holiday is an annual thing, so while you may not get it this year (for the new emperor), you would get it next year lol.
Here you go:
https://www.edarabia.com/japan/public-holidays/
29th April (birthday of Emperor Hirohito), is called Showa Day.
Yea, we’ll likely get the birthday off from next year. Unfortunately, the current emperor’s birthday will not be retained. After all, the retention of Meiji and Showa emperors’ birthdays as public holidays are exceptions rather than the rule. Maybe if people petition for it, the current emperor’s birthday might be kept as a holiday. I think his birthday comes at a good time though since it’s near Christmas and there’s no Christmas holiday here. While the Meiji and Showa reigns were long and marked many significant events, the Heisei era could be thought of as the peaceful era with no wars involving Japan, so that could be one reason to keep it. In any case, I support more holidays lol.