The 108-room Quincy, which opened in February, operates under a flat-rate system where the room charge includes airport pickup, three meals a day, evening cocktails, Internet use, mini-bar, limited amounts of laundry and all local calls. This transparent approach is a clear pitch at businesspeople being squeezed by tighter travel budgets, but appeals to the broader traveler who no longer understand why they should be overcharged for essentials like Internet or non-luxurious extras like a canned drink.

Quoted net rates for early July are SG$228 a night (US$157), an all-inclusive price that is competative for the city-state and, for consumers, laudably easy to understand. By comparison, the same night at The Scarlet would cost SG$175, room only (SG$263 with breakfast and airport pickup). The Naumi is SG$260 including minibar but excluding breakfast or pickup.

This will be a tough year for Singapore’s hotels, with 4,500 new rooms due to come online, even as the number of visitors falls, according to Jones Lang LaSalle Hotels.

The change of economic mood means that consumers are less tolerant of murky pricing policies and hidden extra charges. They still believe they deserve to travel in style. But if they are going to spend their money, they want to know what they’re getting in return. The Quincy is one example of a business response.

S. Korean cosmetics retailer The Face Shop

One air-traffic route that hasn’t slowed amid the recession has been the one between Japan and South Korea. In February, Japanese tourist arrivals in South Korea were up 70% from a year ago, accounting for 48% of all visitors. Numbers were also up from China and Southeast Asia. The primary attraction is shopping, especially cosmetics.

Until now, the reason was the exchange rate, with the won tumbling and the yen soaring, making Seoul an attractive shopping destination. Although the exchange rate has since leveled off, South Korea remains attractive for Japanese, who see it as accessible and safe, and because many South Koreans in retail and hospitality speak Japanese.

The most appealing products are cosmetics, with Korean brands such as Missha, The Face Shop, Skin Food and Nature Republic selling high-quality products at affordable prices for Japanese. At the Nature Republic store in the Myeong-dong shopping area, around 80 percent of customers in April were from Japan, according to the JoongAng newspaper.

In February, the Korea National Tourism Organization chose IKKO, a Japanese transgender makeup artist, as an official ambassador. IKKO has advocated Korean cosmetics in the past.

IKKO, makeup artist and tourism ambassador

“Korean women have better skin than Japanese women,” IKKO said when appointed to the role. “I want to introduce the lifestyle of Korean women, who constantly detox their bodies and minds, to Japan.”

It’s not only the government that has wised up to the revenue potential. Retailers in Myeong-dong are adding Japanese- and Chinese- speaking staff and signage.

The most popular product is Korea-originated BB cream, short for Blemish Balm, which was Japan’s seventh most popular brand last year, according to the Nikkei newspaper. Some 2.6 billion yen (US$26 million) of BB cream were sold in Japan after its launch in April, according to its manufacturer, Hanskin. Eyeshadow, mask packs, mascara and lip gloss from mid-to-low range local brands like Etude House and Missha are also top sellers. Their focus on natural ingredients is an added appeal.

Photo: JoongAng newspaper

“Whenever I come to Korea, I buy around 10 BB creams and refrigerate them so I can use them over a year or so,” Japanese tourist Yoko Wada, 22, told JoongAng at a Hanskin store in Myeong-dong. The price is about half that in Tokyo.

With South Korean brands seen as increasingly trustworthy and desirable in Japan, and Japanese consumers being increasingly cost conscious, the opportunities for South Korean cosmetics brands are obvious. The exchange rate advantage they have enjoyed since October is evaporating, so instead of waiting for the Japanese customers to come to them, they will find it increasingly necessary to target Japanese consumers on their home turf.

To request a sample of Five by Fifty’s Korean Beauty Report, 2009, contact us.

Your message here? (AP Photo via The Daily Beast)

Without wanting to minimize the seriousness of the health issues at hand, the reality is that people around the world are considering how to protect themselves. The prospect of having to wear a face mask if Swine Flu continues to spread may be no big deal in Japan and Asian countries that experienced SARS in 2003. However, for consumers elsewhere unused to such things, the face mask poses a serious fashion dilemma.

The result is the mask becoming a canvas for personal expression. Individuals in affected areas who want to be victims of neither health nor fashion have begun to get creative and decorate their masks, as this photo gallery from The Daily Beast shows.

Mint Designs' cheeky chimp face mask

Some manufacturers like Kimberly Clark already put out limited numbers of colorful masks decorated with Disney cartoon characters for children. Japanese brand Mint Designs has fashioned a cheeky monkey-style mask, and artist Yoriko Yoshida was recently inspired to create a set of beautiful, witty and sometimes faintly morbid face mask illustrations.

Mt. Fuji face mask by Yoriko Yoshida

What’s next? The face mask covers the most important area of the body for communication, and the natural target of the eyes of others. So if face masks do become de rigueur in some places for a while (and it’s far too early to say that they will), the blank white space will become a unique marketing opportunity for the right brand with the right design and the right message.

Contact us to find out more.

Oxford Circus, after it receives the Shibuya Treatment

London’s city planners are borrowing a very simple principle of Japanese pedestrian management – the “scramble” – to try and replicate Tokyo’s Shibuya Crossing in the West End. It will be a sociological as well as logistical innovation for the European city.

London has started consultations on a major regeneration of Oxford Circus, the juncture of Oxford St. and Regent St., according to the Evening Standard. The scheme would stop all traffic at the crossing for 30 seconds at a time to allow pedestrians to cross diagonally as well as perpendicularly, cutting in front of each other in all directions.

In Shibuya, the phenomenon of thousands of people intersecting uninterrupted by traffic is a major tourist attraction in its own right. It’s one of dozens of such diagonal pedestrian crossings in Tokyo and other major cites that streamline consumer paths between key retail areas and transport links. Thousand gather at these intersections as they wait to cross, providing marketers with a captive audience for advertising hoardings and outdoor TVs replaying commercials.

“The parallels between Shibuya and the West End are stark: [both are] important fashion and entertainment areas,” said Danny Chalkley, Westminster Council’s cabinet member for environment and transport.

However, the new crossing will also be a sociological test of citizens’ expectations of personal space. It remains to be seen how frayed Londoners will cope with the multi-directional onslaught of barging pedestrians, something tolerant Tokyoites are well used to.

If approved, work will be complete by spring 2011, in time for the 2012 Olympics.

Oxford Circus today

Shibuya Crossing

Narita Airport is Japan's gateway to the world. Will it see more or less traffic in the months to come?

For a long time we have known that Japanese in their 20s have less interest in traveling abroad than previous generations. But now that so many other formerly rich countries are going through Japan-style economic slumps of their own, is this a pattern that we will see repeated worldwide?

Visa recently conducted a worldwide study that found that two out of three travelers were rethinking their holiday plans this year. (Some newspapers decided it was positive that one in three wasn’t rethinking, surely a sign of negative headline fatigue.) If they weren’t going to cancel their breaks entirely, they were considering holidaying closer to home.

Some airlines are responding with dramatic fuel surcharge reductions (from 14,500 yen to 2,000 yen on an ANA flight from Tokyo to Singapore) or discount campaigns (“35,000 yen return” from Tokyo to London on British Airways), but others are already cutting schedules: JAL is currently operating 33% fewer flights to Bangkok.

As the Golden Week holidays approach, there are also signs that the Japanese travel market is at a tipping point that will strongly favor the domestic industry.

It’s worth noting that flights to SE Asia mid Golden Week are still available for as low as 35,000 yen return (on United), while prices to Okinawa remain sky high. That suggests that people are making travel plans not only for economic reasons; it also “feels wrong” in these lean economic times. There is a deeper shift in consumer behavior going on toward the local, the safe and the humble.

As more demographics choose to travel locally, expect a more diverse range of leisure options to develop in Japan targeted not only at the Silver Market and families with children, but also at sophisticated and wealthy consumers who used to go overseas. They will be looking for international-standard hospitality within easy reach of Japan’s urban centers. Products and services offering understated luxury, eco-awareness, wellness and experience will prosper.

An advertisement announcing the collaboration between ANA and the eagerly awaited film Hana Yori Dango.

A noticeable slump in younger overseas travelers has the Japanese travel industry worried. According to the Japanese National Tourist Association, overseas travelers in their twenties have decreased 35% in the last 10 years, a noticeable difference in comparison with older travelers. Hiroshi Sawabe says that instead of going on vacations, the younger generation has taken to “traveling in their heads” via the Internet.

ANA has come up with a plan to win back this shrinking market segment. By offering a buzz-worthy travel promotion tied with the popular movie finale of Hana Yori Dango, which has a fan base ranging from teens to mid-30s, they can reach their target audience who might be inspired to go overseas by the exotic locations featured in the film.

Travelers are encouraged to visit locations featured in the film.

The travel package includes a choice of Hong Kong or Las Vegas, both of which are featured in the new movie, and gives travelers the option of going with a guide to locations from the film or exploring on their own. In other words, they can do whatever they like – as long as they go!

Natalie Meyer

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ANA official homepage (Japanese)

The Ritz-Carlton and Banyan Tree both opened resorts in Sanya on the island of Hainan in May this year.

Hainan is China’s second largest island, and lies in the South China Sea. Sharing the same latitude as Hawaii, Hainan boasts sandy beaches, palm trees and a pleasant climate. Despite its attributes, it was only discovered as a holiday venue 20 years ago, only to suffer economic decline for the last decade.

Until recently. Within easy reach of Mainland China and a mere 1.5 hours from Hong Kong, Sanya, Hainan’s southernmost city, is becoming a destination of choice for tourists around Asia.

The Ritz-Carlton, Sanya is situated at Yalong Bay – the last on a long stretch of golden beach. This massive hotel features 450 rooms including 33 pool villas, as well as 21 luxury suites. Each guest room is a vast 60 square meters, possessing its own private balcony and standalone tub.

Aside from spacious rooms, the hotel has also set up the largest Ritz-Carlton spa in the region in Sanya. The ESPA at The Ritz-Carlton has a total of 24 private treatment rooms and six private spa suites offering a mix of Eastern and Western treatments.

The Ritz-Carlton, Sanya says that, since the hotel opened one month ago, visitors have predominantly been from Hong Kong and Mainland China. Already the resort has had requests to rent villas for one to two months and some guests have stayed two to three weeks.

Similarly, Banyan Tree Sanya says guests so far have mostly been from Guangzhou, Shenzhen, Beijing and some from Hong Kong. A small percentage of visitors have come from Russia, Japan, Korea and Europe.

Banyan Tree Sanya is located 5km from Sanya town, close to Luhuitou Park and Hyton Hotel Sanya.

Banyan Tree Sanya is an all-pool villa hotel, with 21 standard villas and a selection of others, including the Spa Pool Villa. Each comes with an open-air bathtub and landscaped garden. The hotel features the resort group’s signature spa facilities, including eight treatment pavilions.

The Mandarin Oriental Hotel Group also plans to open a hotel here. Following some delays, the hotel is due to open in late 2008. These three are just a taster of the resorts set to come to Sanya as tourists from around Asia rediscover Hainan Island.

Tamsin Bradshaw

Traditional sightseeing spots in Kyoto are becoming more accessible.

Kyoto is an ancient city full of interesting sights and tourist hotspots, but it is often difficult for the handicapped to get around.

That does not, however, have to prevent individuals from touring the city. Now, a Kyoto-based group is getting together in the hope of eliminating some of Kyoto’s inaccessibility. “Barikan! Kyoto” features over 200 different places that have been visited and judged by members of a spinal injury association in Kyoto. “Barikan” stands for “barrier-free sightseeing” in Japanese.

With the help of the Internet, they are pooling their information together in order to figure out what parts of Kyoto have easy access and what parts do not. It makes it simple for individuals to decide whether they can travel alone or if they should bring friends along. The site also includes information about different aspects of life in Kyoto, such as jobs, accommodation, and food.

Websites like these could reflect the changing attitude in Japan towards the issue of handicap accessibility and barriers. As Japan’s aging population becomes more and more of a reality, so will the need for a more accessible Japan. That is one of Barikan’s goals – by making it easier for the handicapped to tour Kyoto, the group hopes to bring to the forefront the issue of accessibility in Japan.

Natalie Meyer