Sake cats and dogs

by | Jul 4, 2018 | Sake News from Japan

The Print & Promotion site takes a look at some furry friends being used to promote sake.

This is the third time the Takarayama brewery have put their “Dog sell sake, cat make sake” (酒を売る犬、酒を造る猫) label on the market. [Technically “sake-selling dog, sake-making cat” but there really isn’t much to argue about.] The idea comes from two young brewery workers: future kuramoto-tōji Keita Watanabe, and Hidenori Wakamatsu in sales.

Subtitled “Precious friends and the sake that brings them together” the label and advertising telling their story through cartoon dog and cat characters has been a hit on social media. The sake was developed in association with Liquor Innovation Kurand.Watanabe and Wakamatsu were in the same year at university, and produce a sake with a different theme and flavour each year, garnering plenty of media coverage. 2016 was “meeting” (出会い), 2017 was “training” (修行) and 2018 is “starting” (はじまり). The dog and cat meet, grow and keep on creating new stories, all through a bottle of sake.

The two brewery workers split up after university, spending three years training separately before getting together again and deciding to make sake. They wanted to communicate that feeling of a story in the making, and create a sake that would bring good friends together. The design of this year’s label, showing a stern-looking cat with glasses and a paddle next to a goofy dog with an apron in front of a brewery, sets the scene. The sake will be on sale from 1 June 2018.

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