マルコメ | 世界初カワイイ味噌汁 原宿味（Definition of Japanese Kawaii） | 2016
Can You Define "Kawaii" in Two Minutes? / Marukome "World's First Kawaii Miso Soup Harajuku Flavor"
Packaging miso soup as "kawaii" sounds like a strange combination, but somehow it works. In 2016, Marukome launched a new product aimed at young people: the "world's first" cute instant miso soup. The promotional film made for it was done with insane levels of commitment, and it ended up winning Gold at ADFEST 2017.
The problem
Marukome is a company with over 160 years of history, but over the past 40 years, per-person miso consumption has dropped by 50%. Miso in particular struggles to catch the interest of young people, and rarely comes up in conversation. Left as is, it risked becoming something old-fashioned. In September (month 9) of 2015, Marukome teamed up with Asobisystem, known for spreading Harajuku culture both in Japan and abroad, and launched an unprecedented project to develop a new kind of miso soup under the theme "MISO KAWAII." The commitment ran deep: model Natsume Mito selected the ingredients herself, and the soup included heart-shaped fu (wheat gluten) and cute kamaboko (fish cake). Through outdoor rock festivals, events for "blue-text" style models, and even an event in Paris featuring Kyary Pamyu Pamyu, Marukome kept creating touchpoints with young people through the sheer gap of "wait, why is there miso soup here?!"
The insight
The challenge was the relationship with young people. Marukome itself felt like a distant, unfamiliar company to them, so before selling the product, they needed people to first get the sense that "Marukome is doing something interesting." Build buzz through social media and events first, then go mass — the order was flipped. For the film that would serve as the culmination of this whole project, they chose the theme of "defining kawaii." According to director Eri Sawatari, the team thought deeply about the history of kawaii culture, tracing it far back in their research. Starting from the question, "He called me kawaii (pretty). But Mom said I used to be kawaii (cute) long ago. The same ambiguous word, kawaii. What does it mean?" — the directors spent two minutes exploring the concept, ranging from traditional Japanese folktales to contemporary visuals.
The idea
The project originally came as a request from Dentsu to director Soujiro Kamatani, who then brought in Eri Sawatari because he wanted a "fresh female perspective." Ancient gods, cheerleaders, neon signs. A fleeting glimpse of thigh as a high school girl pulls up her sock. A pastel DNA helix unwinding, paint splattering across a skull, and in the grand finale, a girl diving into a bowl of miso soup in a perfect swallow dive. Completely incomprehensible, yet undeniably cool. Linking Japan with cute, strange imagery might be a cliché, but the directing duo of Sawatari and Kamatani cranked that cliché up to eleven and infused it with a crazy, surreal kind of beauty. Structurally, the idea is the classic move of framing something with an adjective it doesn't usually carry. But the sheer intensity of carrying that through — not just in a single film, but across an entire long-term project spanning product development, events, and social media — is what makes it so remarkable.
What happened
Dentsu Tokyo won Gold in the Film category at ADFEST 2017 for "World's First Kawaii Miso Soup." The directing duo signed with Bandits (France) in 2016 and went on to create a L'Oréal commercial for the European market. The goal had been to maximize buzz about Marukome on social media, and the team reportedly saw an increase in young people visiting the company's recruitment site, with some even saying this project was what led them to decide to join Marukome. The product itself went on sale nationwide at convenience stores starting in February 2016.
Afterthought
I used to think that even an ordinary idea (sorry) could surprise you if executed well — but once I looked into this one, it turned out to be anything but ordinary (correction made). From product development to long-term social media nurturing, events, the film, the award, and even recruiting, this was a project with a consistent design, genuinely trying to rebuild the relationship with young people. The sheer intensity of the film is stunning, more than enough to explain the Gold win, and the directing duo's depth of research and touch of madness are wonderful too. "Clients come to us wanting something crazy." "Japanese people don't need perfection. They can find beauty in things that are broken or dirty. That's our approach." I absolutely love that final scene of diving into the bowl of miso soup.
