New products are on the way! Rich or Dry? Dry? Summer 2024: The Great Beer War

It’s hot; since the beginning of July, Tokyo has been experiencing a series of extremely hot days with temperatures topping 35°C (95°F). One evening, when a FRIDAY reporter went shopping at a supermarket near his home, he found a group of sweaty office workers on their way home from work occupying the beer shelves.

One of them, a man who appeared to be in his 40s, was staring at Kirin Beer’s “Hararekaze,” which was released in April of this year. Perhaps attracted by the pop-up featuring actress Mio Imada (27), he put three 500 ml cans in his basket and quickly went to the cash register. Three beers on a weekday evening is an extravagant evening drink, but perhaps it is an unavoidable expense to relieve fatigue from work and the heat.

The “Hararekaze” is the first new standard beer Kirin has produced in 17 years. Beer is normally characterized by the bitterness of hops, but Harukaze has a moderate bitterness that makes it smooth and easy to drink. On the other hand, it is made with 100% malted barley, which gives it a robust barley flavor, making it light yet drinkable. Young people who don’t like beer and middle-aged and older beer lovers can both enjoy drinking it,” said beer writer Hiroyuki Tomie.

The sales of Hararekaze were so strong that it broke the record for the highest sales of a new beer product Kirin has launched in the past 15 years, surpassing its annual sales target of 2 million cases in one month, more than 40% of its annual sales target. With this hit, Kirin aims to return to the No. 1 position in the industry, according to the company.

Until the mid-1990s, Kirin dominated the industry with Kirin Lager beer. Kirin Beer, the predecessor to Kirin Lager, was an extremely long-selling product that had existed since 1888, and it was a scene from the Showa period when fathers would come home, open a bottle of Kirin Beer, and watch the Giants game on TV. From 1972 to ’85, the company’s share of the industry was 60%, with a high of 63%. It was to the point where people said, ‘If we don’t do anything, we will be violating the Anti-Monopoly Law,'” said economic journalist Takai Naoyuki.

While Kirin was leading the market, Asahi Beer was struggling. In 1985, when Kirin had 60% of the market, Asahi’s share was less than 10%. Some people were even making fun of Asahi Beer as a “sunset beer,” comparing it to the setting of the sun.

Aiming for a comeback, Asahi launched “Asahi Draft Beer” (Maruef) in 1986. The nickname “Marufu” came from the fact that the internal development symbol was “F”. The following year, in March ’87, “Asahi Super Dry” was introduced to the world. MARUEF” was developed with the goal of creating a royal beer by concentrating Asahi’s technological capabilities, but “Super Dry,” its little brother, was a very different kind of beer, a “next generation beer.

In developing “Super Dry,” Asahi conducted a consumer survey of 5,000 consumers and found that young people were looking for a refreshing beer. We established the concept of ‘a beer that goes well with sashimi and tempura and can be drunk in large gulps,'” says Takai.

When it was first launched, “Super Dry” was sometimes criticized as “not a beer” because of its lightness, but in its first year, 13.5 million cases of “Super Dry” were sold. The fact that Kirin’s “Hararekaze,” introduced at the beginning of this article, targets 4.3 million cases per year should give some idea of the tremendous sales potential of “Super Dry.