2006.02

The 12th result of dog and cat keeping rate in 2005 is announced. - The rate of 40's and 30's owners is increasing　(Page 50)
The 12th result of dog and cat keeping rate in 2005 was announced by Pet Food Manufactures Association (chairman Toshio Takahara, Chuo-ku Tokyo). The research was made by using Internet as same as last time. The result of keeping rate of dog is 19.4% (last year 18.8%) and cat is 14.9% (last year 15.1%), and the number of dog to be kept is 13,068,000 (last year 12,457,000) and cat is 12,097,000 (last year 11,636,000. So the number of both dog and cat to be kept is tendency to increase.
In this research, a question "about dog and cat's health care" was made for the first time. The rate of owner "care about its health very much" plus "care about its health a little bit" is more than 90%. That means a consideration of health for dog and cat is essential for the owner. Concrete examples of the health care of dog owner are "care about a condition of feces and urine. (65.4%)", "give dog food in decided time and decided number of times. (61.1%)" and "give dog food considering its age. (57.7%)" and as for cat owner are "care about a condition of feces and urine. (58.5%)", "touch its body often and care about its condition and figure (51.5%)" and "give cat food considering its age. (51.1%)" That shows many owners attach importance to "food control" and "health condition check" as the health care and these cares seem to have been established.

NATTY CAT lands on Japan.　(Page 28)
NATTY CAT, which is organic cat sand made in Australia, landed on Japan. It is organic cat sand in which chemical products are completely excluded and won "the small company in Australia prize" in 1991. Alfalfa that is raw material wraps excrement and chlorophyll that is natural deodorant ingredient controls activities of bacteria and stink of ammonia. As it has strong absorbency and dries quickly, cat visits the restroom without hesitating. If cat is unwilling to go to restroom in the house, it goes out. NATTY CAT reduces cat to go out. As a result, it prevents the appearance of wild cats in Australia. A part of sand absorbed urine drop off the mat, so it is easy to clean. It is environment-friendly and you can bury it in the ground because it becomes natural manure after using NATTY CAT.
Papillon (representative Yukiyoshi Kato, Moriguchi-shi Osaka) sells thie product in Japan.

AOS Technologies sells iSeePet FOMA edition.　(Page 31)
AOS Technologies (Minato-ku Tokyo) held a briefing session of "iSeePet360 FOMA edition" at Akihabara Daibiru on January 19. This product which applies to NTT DoCoMo's FOMA can receive moving image and also can transmit and receive sound. It will be sold at volume home electronics retailers, pet shops and DoCoMo shops at the beginning of March. It is open pricing.
The first product was come out in November, 2002. It had attracted attention as a product which could confirm automatic feeder, sound and moving image by computer and mobile phone.
Answering to the request from pet owner "I want to make sure the moving image of my pet on the picture easily", a new product is developed. You can receive not a static image but a moving image and can transmit and receive sound using function of video telephone by FOMA edition. You can control to call pet by melody and feeding by mobile phone as same as former product. In case pet owner uses this function, he (or she) needs to buy transmission card exclusive to FOMA and make a line contract.
AOS Technologies will expand this product targeting a pet owner who lives alone that seems increasing tendency. Also they tackle a dog training from a remote place with Kawano e-dog considering effective utilization.

Nisshin Pet Food starts mail-order sales.　(Page 28)
Nisshin Pet Food (president Takao Masui, Chiyoda-ku Tokyo) held a press conference at Limapuluh Aoyama La-Place on January 17 and announced that they were going to sell "JP-Style Dog Food" from February 1. This dog food sticks to made in Japan and is sold by original mail-order sales route (telephone, internet and fax) to consumer directly, not by retail store route. President Masui points out that a deflation of consumer goods, tendency to keep small dog and consumer's needs demanding for safety and relief make pet food's distribution quantity larger besides retail shop route. So, Nisshin Pet Food is going to enter into pet food mail- order sales market which is said 8billion to 9billion. The company started mail-order sales of food last April and had dealt with seeking route.
The selling way of JP-Style is to choose item suitable to dog from 6 kinds of semi-moist foods which are for 1 to 7 years old (2kinds), for 8 years old(2kinds) and for diet (2kinds) by counseling. This product has characteristics such as using domestic material, domestic product, producing after receive an order and not using preservatives (best in 60 days) to and is delivered from the factory to consumer within 15 days after receiving order. The order is accepted from 1.5kg unit and the product is handed on receipt of the money or payment is made by credit card. Sales price is 3,150 yen per 1.5kg (include tax, postage 525 yen is extra). If you buy more than 5,250 yen, postage is free.
At the first time you purchase the product, 20 items of dog's information such as kind, condition and taste are confirmed. The purchaser is registered and can get discount, veterinary's health advice as a member's privilege. On the other hand, the company uses the customer connection and information, new businesses like development and proposal of new product, issuing newsletter and travel are planned.
Mr. Takuya Sugimura of Premium division, who took charge of planning and development, is targeting a class of having high interest in pet's health and said "400,000 out of 13 million dogs kept in Japan will be target. We aim at getting 40,000 dogs / 10,000 users from them." They will make an effort to sales promotion by distributing 10, 000 of free samples and advertisement in newspaper.

Japan Wayne holds "2006 Spring All Pet Products Fair" for the first time in Tokyo　(Page 29)Japan Wayne (president Yasushi Maeda, Settsu-shi Osaka) which expands wholesale business mainly into pet specialty shops in Kansai and Kanto area will hold "2006 Spring All Pet Products Fair" at Tokyo Trade Center (Hamamatsucho-kan) on March 1 and 2. This is the first time to have exhibition in Tokyo and it is attached with opening of Tokyo branch. 70 makers exhibit more than 18,000 items and floor space is 500 tsubo. Also "25th Spring All Pet Products Fair" will be held at Osaka Merchandise Mart Building on April 19 and 20 as in other years.
In the fair various plans are ready such as new product contest, experience corner of business mail-order sales site for shop "POSH PET CLUB", corner of sharpening scissors and "present" for customers who purchase more than 200,000 yen.
Japan Wayne welcomes a retail shop which has no deal in the area. Invitation card arrives after sending application.
Detail is as follows.
[Contact]
the person in charge : Tanaka / Miura
TEL 072-654-1050

[2006 Spring All Pet Products Fair] (Tokyo)
The date and time : March 1 and 2 in 2006, 10:00 to 17:00
Place : Tokyo Trade Center (Hamamatsucho-kan) 5th floor. 1-7-8 Kaigan Minato-ku Tokyo

[25th Spring All Pet Products Fair] (Osaka)
The date and time : April 19 and 20 in 2006, 10:00 to 17:00
Place : Osaka Merchandise Mart Building (OMM) 2nd floor. 1-7-31 Otemae Chuo-ku Osaka-shi

Shintoa Corporation becomes subsidiary of Kanematsu Corporation.　(Page 29)
Kanematsu Corporation (president Noriyasu Miwa, Chuo-ku Kobe-shi Hyogo) acquired majority stocks of Shintoa Corporation (president Shuichi Yamada, Chiyoda-ku Tokyo) and made Shintoa Corporation subsidiary company. Holding rate of Kanematsu Corporation became 63.2 % by acquiring normal stocks from Mitsubishi Corporation which was the largest stock holder and other stockholders. Shintoa continues usual business after becoming the subsidiary company.
Kanematsu Corporation expanded not only the existing commercial rights but also policy of strengthen profit through new investment and M & A declaring a theme "Complete revival. - Finishing second establishment" under the new medium-range management plan "New KG 200". The company announced grounds for acquiring stocks is "The management policy of Shintoa Corporation matched our business model. We can expect synergy because their business field will construct complementary relationship with our strong business field."
As a group company of Mitsubishi Corporation, Shintoa Corporation had pursued original trading company's function at strong fields of aviation, vending machine and food declaring "Create added value centering human being and environment" as the company philosophy by now. They aim at much more development as a group of Kanematsu Corporation.

Meiji University Pet Industry Club holds the 3rd seminar.　(Page 29)
Meiji University Pet Industry Club (chairman Koichi Akatsu, the number of member is 35) held a seminar at Meiji University Surugadai campus on January 10. The number of attendance was 14 including a new member. A lecture was made by Minoru Harada and a theme was "Chang the way of thinking". Giving an example of technical skill of Mr. Jack Welch, former CEO of General Electric, lectured to face to change the way of thinking and the importance of imaging the success.
This is the third time to hold the seminar. The theme of last year's new year's party was "Ono shoji history" by vice chairman Tetsuo Ono who entered in 1941, and last year's cool breeze party was "Fuzzy as a Philosophy" by professor Masao Mukaizono who is a dean of Meiji University, School of Science and Technology. He was introduced by vice chairman Toshiaki Masuda who entered in 1942.
After the seminar, a regular new year's party was held at trattoria naporio shitamachi syokudou which is a simple but elegant restaurant near the university. Every member enjoyed drinking and promoted mutual friendship and exchanged information. The new member is Mr. Naoki Okura who belongs to the first sales department of Suisaku.
The club was set up in January, 1990. It reaches 16 years this year. Chairman Akatsu said "This club is composed of wide generation from Mr. Ryoji Ueda who entered in 1944 and Mr. Shigezo Kamihata who entered in 1946 to young person who graduated recently. I would like to invite university students of Meiji University once more." The club makes the participation fee half price at the first time expecting a lot of participants who are graduated from Meiji University.

Tokyo Aiken College obtains authorization of educational foundation vocational school.　(Page 30)
Tokyo Aiken College (chairman of the board of directors Takeo Kubota, Nakano-ku Tokyo) obtained authorization of educational foundation vocational school. Technicians of dog beauty treatment, animal nursing and training are trained here. This college has proceeded with application procedure for authorization since 2004. And a commemoration party was held at Century Hyatt Tokyo (Shinjuku-ku Tokyo) on January 14. Tokyo Aiken College is a long established college which was established in 1970 and celebrated the 35th anniversary last year.