By the numbers

As you’ve heard from me and anyone else watching the sake industry, the price of everything breweries need (rice, obviously, but also fuel, packaging, logistics, salaries and other necessities) has risen sharply enough that they can no longer absorb it by cutting into their own margins. 

Many of the biggest breweries announced price increases in October 2025, an average of 5% for Takara, 10% for Kizakura, and anywhere between 5% and 20% for Gekkeikan and Hakutsuru. And sooner or later, smaller breweries had to follow.

Yoshino Jozo, makers of Hanatomoe, raised prices by an average of 14% at the beginning of October, along with an appeal to consumers to support them in their commitment to local agriculture and the local environment. Kinoshita Shuzo, makers of Tamagawa, increased their prices by approximately 15% at the start of November, giving a good idea of what’s in store.

As John Gauntner often points out, many small breweries operate close to or in the red, with some routinely making a loss as one of a group of companies that make their money elsewhere. With the added pressure of the pandemic, fewer people drinking and now a sharp jump in rice prices… what happens when there’s no room left to manoeuvre?

The sake industry is also facing a prolonged manpower shortage (even ably supplemented by increasing woman-power), which made me wonder if the twin forces of not enough people and too many small companies would lead to a wave of mergers and acquisitions over the next few years. The wine industry is no stranger to consolidation, described recently by IWC’s Canopy magazine as “less about owning vineyards, and more about controlling access to a shrinking market” … “to survive an era of moderation and chronic inflation”, which sounds all too familiar. The article also points out that if handled well, consolidation can still respect and preserve diversity–but is that also possible for sake?

It didn’t sound feasible at first – as Hitoshi Utsunomiya of JSS says, grapes are 80% of a wine, so you could keep the character of a vineyard even if someone else makes or sells the wine. But the opposite is true for sake, where human intervention plays the critical role, plus factors specific to a brewery such as water, staff and tradition. There could be a middle ground, where breweries give up or share non-production functions (marketing, administration, etc.), and some brewers are currently operating out of other breweries: those who lost their buildings in the Noto peninsula earthquake nearly 2 years ago. Sake Industry News also reported on the new Kofune craft sake brewery (or sake-adjacent brewery, which I think is a good way of putting it) which positions itself as a “shared space” where independent brewers can use their facilities and equipment to make whatever they want. (More thoughts on that in a moment.)

Many breweries have already shifted from high volumes to smaller, higher-value added sake in response to changes in consumer preferences which left them needing to make similar revenue while selling fewer litres, but even those that successfully made the change have new problems turning up at their door. I started writing this newsletter almost two weeks ago, and this topic came up in conversation again just last night. The industry is not what it used to be, and the rate of change is accelerating, affecting not just the equipment needed to make specific types of sake but also the skills and personality demanded of the people who make it.

I don’t have a good closing line for this. It’s nowhere near over.
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Sources: Yoshino Jozo/Hanatomoe newsletter and website, personal conversations.
New Ground: Consolidation in the 21st Century by James Lawrence for Canopy (4 Nov 2025)