マルコメ | 料亭の味 カップみそ汁 夜食篇 | 2015
Kindness as a Secret Ingredient / Marukome "Ryotei no Aji Cup Miso Soup: Midnight Snack"
The third animated commercial in the "Ryotei no Aji" series came out in February 2015. A daughter on edge from exam prep, and a father who's lost the knack for talking to her. So late one night, he quietly puts together a midnight snack for her. That's the whole story. And somehow that's exactly what makes it so moving.
The problem
To win over young people and young families who don't really think much about miso and have no particular brand preference, Marukome needed to present "Ryotei no Aji" as something familiar and in step with the times. They chose to depict a scene centered on miso soup using Japanese animation, a medium drawing attention from around the world. There was a clear vision behind it: to make "Ryotei no Aji" a beloved brand by moving viewers to tears, by touching their hearts. The decision to let go of any unnatural product explanation or pitch gave the creative team total freedom.
The insight
Story ideas for this series often start from someone's real personal experience. The client and creative team members each bring specific true stories about family and food, which are then carefully shaped and woven together. They placed something very concrete and real, a midnight snack, at the point of contact in the universal relationship between a teenage daughter and her father. Feelings get conveyed not through words but through a lumpy rice ball and a cup of miso soup. In a sense, this updates the grammar of Japanese commercials long used by companies like Tokyo Gas and Ajinomoto, bringing it into the most contemporary format: animation.
The idea
In the days before her university entrance exams, a tense silence hangs between a high school girl and her father. One night, after hearing from his wife that their daughter has been raiding the fridge late at night while studying, the father quietly sets out a rice ball and a cup of miso soup on the table. The next morning, the daughter thanks her mother for the midnight snack, but her mother has no idea what she's talking about. To find out the truth, the daughter goes back downstairs, and sure enough, there's her father. "I just got kind of hungry," he says. "Want some too?" She answers quietly, "Yeah." He suggests they play rock-paper-scissors to decide who gets which rice ball, and her voice and expression soften. Through this small, playful gesture, the clumsy kindness of a father finally reaches his daughter. Within just 90 seconds, the emotional sensibility of Tokyo Gas-style storytelling and the open space that animation allows sit together perfectly.
What happened
The ad became a talking point as a commercial that makes people cry. While an ordinary TV commercial typically takes about three months to complete from the initial briefing, this series takes roughly ten months to produce. From the second installment onward through to the present, the music for the commercials has been handled by Kotringo. Nearly ten years after its 2015 debut, the series is still going, with twelve installments produced as of January 2024.
Afterthought
The description still holds true today: "It's really just doing a Tokyo Gas or Ajinomoto kind of worldview, but in animation" — and yet, maybe because of the cold weather lately, it still hits home emotionally. Being animated makes it easier to put yourself in the characters' shoes and overlay it with your own memories. And hey, good luck to everyone taking exams! I'm rooting for you too.
