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

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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. 

Thematic (Sector/Industry)

Japan Consumer discretionary / Thematic (Sector/Industry)

Japan has a vast number of competing loyalty programmes and until five years ago Japanese consumers would often have as many as 10 loyalty point cards in their wallets.In recent years consumers have gradually begun to whittle down their choices and today there are clear indications of which schemes will dominate.Loyalty point schemes have always been key drivers of shopping behaviour but more recently it has become clear that the choice of e-commerce store is often driven by which loyalty point schemes can be used.At the same time, there are increasing signs that the leading loyalty schemes could take the lead in Japan's emerging cashless payment sector.

Japan has a vast number of competing loyalty programmes and until five years ago Japanese consumers would often have as many as 10 loyalty point cards in their wallets.In recent years consumers have gradually begun to whittle down their choices and today there are clear indications of which schemes will dominate.Loyalty point schemes have always been key drivers of shopping behaviour but more recently it has become clear that the choice of e-commerce store is often driven by which loyalty point schemes can be used.At the same time, there are increasing signs that the leading loyalty schemes could take the lead in Japan's emerging cashless payment sector.

Loyalty Points In Japan: More Loyalty, More Points and the Conduit to Cashless Payments