The Appeal of the Minimalist "Bean to Bar" Style: Returning Chocolate Born from Japanese Sensibilities to the World.

When you push the concept of "minimal" in chocolate to its limit, you eventually arrive at the raw material: cacao beans. We aim to create chocolate that focuses on the cacao beans themselves. Our distinctive style is "Bean to Bar," where we handle everything from sourcing the beans to producing the final chocolate bars. The flavor of cacao changes surprisingly depending on the origin and processes like fermentation, drying, and roasting. Even when using the same cacao beans and sugar, you can get citrusy aromas or nutty flavors. Just like wine or coffee, the ingredients themselves have rich individualities. That is why we want to bring out the inherent appeal of cacao without adding anything unnecessary. I chose the name "Minimal" as a word to express that philosophy.

It really is just that. However, it is hard to convey that with words alone. That is why we offer free tastings at our stores, allowing customers to actually experience the differences in flavor based on origin and production methods. In addition to chocolate bars, we also offer gateau chocolate and cookies developed by pastry chefs, homemade hot chocolate, and specialty coffee. My co-founder has been active as a barista for many years, so we have a strong commitment to coffee as well. Specialty coffee and Bean to Bar chocolate are similar in that they both represent a culture of bringing out the individuality of the ingredients.

Explaining that simply is very difficult (laughs). During my time at my previous consulting firm, I saw specialty coffee and Bean to Bar chocolate gaining momentum as a new culture while on a business trip to New York. At the time, however, I only felt it was "interesting" as a consumer and never imagined I would start a specialty chocolate shop myself. But as I approached 30, I couldn't suppress the feeling of wanting to "challenge something new." Around that time, I had the opportunity to eat homemade chocolate at a specialty coffee shop in Nakameguro, Tokyo. At that moment, I was shocked, thinking, "What is this?" Even though it only used cacao and sugar, a citrusy aroma spread through my mouth. That's when I remembered my Bean to Bar experience in New York.

Exactly. I couldn't forget that moving experience, and while I was undecided about my career path after resigning, I invited the barista who owned that cafe to start a business together. That was the beginning of β ace Inc., which operates Minimal, and he still plays a central role in product development today. Looking back, I feel my life has been guided by accidental encounters. I have never been the type to set a clear goal and move straight toward it. Rather, I feel like I've been going in directions I found interesting at the time, while letting myself go with the flow of the river.

I was born and raised in Gifu City, Gifu Prefecture. Since high school, I had a strong longing for Tokyo and would take overnight buses to Harajuku to buy clothes. When it came to university, I was determined to go to a university in Tokyo, not Osaka or Nagoya.

University life at Keio University was fun. I was passionate about soccer until high school, and I joined a soccer club at university as well. My club friends, both seniors and juniors, are still close today. In my studies at the Faculty of Business and Commerce, I found understanding numbers and jitsugaku (science) interesting. I focused quite intensely on my studies before exams, and partway through, I began receiving a benefit-type scholarship. At the time, I was also interested in working and held multiple part-time jobs, mainly in restaurants. From my second year, I started traveling abroad during long breaks. I traveled through Europe, Central and South America, and Asia as a backpacker. This was influenced by Kotaro Sawaki's travelogue "Midnight Express," which my seniors at the time were also reading. I think the experience of encountering different cultures and values was very significant.

At university, I studied a wide range of classes that interested me, including philosophy and history. From my third year, wanting to know more about the world, I studied international economics in the laboratory of Professor Yoko Wake (now Professor Emeritus). Perhaps even then, I had a vague awareness that I wanted to be involved in a business that expands globally someday.

No, not at all. I think I was a very ordinary university student. In my job search, I initially aspired to the international finance industry. But I didn't get any job offers, and I started to doubt myself, wondering if the industry wasn't right for me. That's when I encountered a consulting firm through an acquaintance's introduction. They took "right-brain" things like sensibilities and people's thoughts and organized them logically to implement them into businesses and organizations. I felt a strong attraction to that work. The senior employees I met during interviews also looked very radiant to me.

As a new graduate, I was assigned to the new business development department. But at first, I didn't achieve any results at all. It was truly painful. Even so, I braced myself, thinking "I just have to do it," and worked desperately with my team to increase sales. After that, I was involved in organizational and human resource development for national clients, and in my late 20s, I reached a position leading a team of about 30 people. The work was quite hard, but it was very rewarding.

However, as I mentioned earlier, as I approached 30, I couldn't suppress the feeling of wanting to "challenge something completely new." Looking back now, influenced by my father, I had always had a longing for "work that involves making things."

When I was in high school, I was also influenced by books such as Junichiro Tanizaki's "In Praise of Shadows" and Kakuzo Okakura's "The Book of Tea." I didn't fully understand the content, but I was strongly drawn to Japan's unique aesthetic sense and the beauty of its language. The sense of finding richness within simplicity and the Japanese craftsmanship of layering ingenuity within constraints—I feel those values are connected to Minimal's chocolate making.

During my consultant days, I worked to translate "right-brain" things like the emotions and thoughts of people and organizations into the "left-brain" domains of business and organizational design. Now, at Minimal, I want to deliver the delicate sensibilities and creativity unique to Japanese people to the world in the form of chocolate.

Japan's birthrate is declining and its population is aging, and the labor force will decrease. A shrinking economic scale may be unavoidable. But I don't think we need to be pessimistic because of that. Rather, when I think about what value Japan can project to the world, I feel there is potential precisely in the "Japanese sensibility" and "craftsmanship" that I have been drawn to since high school. Just as Japanese cuisine is highly regarded worldwide, Japanese food culture has delicacy and depth. That should be fully applicable globally. Chocolate is a culture of Western origin, but I think it would be interesting to do a business that reinterprets and reconstructs it through Japanese sensibilities and returns it to the world.

Yes. The theme for the next 10 years is "to global." We have received high international praise for our quality, such as becoming the first Japanese chocolate brand to win a gold medal at a global chocolate competition. While we are currently expanding mainly within Tokyo, we are preparing to deliver "Made in Tokyo" chocolate to the world.

Since the beginning of my business, I have been greatly influenced by Maruyama Coffee, known as a pioneer of specialty coffee, and Aramasa Shuzo, which attracts global attention for its innovative sake brewing. In particular, I even accompanied Kentaro Maruyama of Maruyama Coffee on sourcing trips to cacao bean origins. Going to the sites, talking with farmers, and seeing the production areas with my own eyes—he taught me the importance of that. It's the same for chocolate. I want to deliver value that includes not just the product itself, but also the land, culture, and the lives of the producers behind the cacao beans. At Minimal, we build continuous relationships with farmers working to improve quality by purchasing cacao beans at prices above the market rate. Through such fair trade efforts, I hope to contribute to stable incomes for producers and sustainable cultivation. While there have been difficult phases recently, such as the soaring price of cacao, I want to overcome them, root the Bean to Bar culture in Japan, and connect that to global expansion.

I don't think I have any special talent for management. I have come this far supported by encounters with founding members and many seniors. During my university days, I was a truly ordinary student and never imagined I would become the CEO of a startup. Therefore, I think it's natural that many students haven't been able to have a clear vision yet. But that is precisely why you "can become anyone." During your university years, when your intellect and physical strength are at their peak, try everything you are interested in. And if possible, try to pursue them to the limit. That experience should lead to your future. Recently, I have come to be moved anew by the depth of the philosophy of "independence and self-respect" and the words of "Gakumon no susume (An Encouragement of Learning)" that I couldn't fully understand as a student. I now strongly feel the value of the time I spent at Keio University and the DNA I inherited there.

Age may not matter when it comes to taking on challenges. For myself, a new challenge of global expansion is about to begin. I want to continue moving forward so as not to be outdone by my juniors.