Oyatsu TIMES

Oyatsu TIMES

Client: JR East Japan Railway Company
Design Company: NOSIGNER™
Creative Direction: NOSIGNER (Eisuke Tachikawa) 
Art Direction: NOSIGNER (Eisuke Tachikawa), DODO DESIGN (Minoru Dodo)
Graphic Design: NOSIGNER (Eisuke Tachiakwa, Kosuke Noma & Tomoro Hanzawa) , DODO DESIGN (Kazuhiko Hasegawa & Maya Asada)
Illustration: Masatoshi Tabuchi
Copy Writing: Hiroko Kawabata
Photography: NOSIGNER (Tomoro Hanzawa)
Country: Japan

WHY: To support producers who received repetitional damage, and revitalize East Japan.

The Fukushima Daiichi Nuclear Power Plant accident that occurred immediately after the Great East Japan Earthquake in 2011, caused a wide spread of agricultural products to be affected by health and food safety concerns. Although most of these products were safe, the tsunami had covered approximately 500km of East Japan coastal areas, where there were parts of the side of the Japan Sea that had no damage whatsoever. However, the whole of “East Japan” and “Tohoku” both uniformly received reputational damage. As smaller companies of the food industry suffered from this reputational damage, we questioned what we could do to support and revive the whole of East Japan.

HOW: A brand that aims for regional revitalization by distributing delicious snacks from East Japan, throughout the country.

We performed comprehensive production and art direction of JR East Japan’s snack brand “Oyatsu TIMES” of their regional discovery project “Nomono” (meaning “of something” in Japanese). Oyatsu TIMES is a brand that aimed to revitalize Tohoku and areas of East Japan by selecting delicious snacks made in various parts of East Japan, repackaging them into pouch-size so they can be carried around easily, as we distributed them nationwide. By transporting these packages products, we were able to reduce transportation costs by placing them in the cargos of overnight buses run by JR, resulting in a price of the product to have a good competition in the metropolitan market. In addition, by creating a newspaper-like package with articles of the producers and products listed at the front, with travel information and destinations on the back, we were able to find a good PR balance between the products and the railway company.

To give a sense of strong presence in stores such as the convenience store, we designed a simple yet eye-catching package based on a colorful two-tone stripe that resembled the contents inside.

NOW: Due to a higher response rate than expected, sales of smaller manufacturers have increased in each region.

Oyatsu TIMES, utilizing JR East Japan’s sales force and sales networks holding various group companies, achieved sales of approximately 300% of the expected sales, where its’ lineup has expanded to approximately 30 types. Through this project, we were able to create a new market for snacks, increasing its’ sales at a substantial rate, where smaller manufacturers were able to leave a large impact in business. We look forward to the continuing growth and contribution this brand will have to revitalize East Japan as a whole again.