永谷園「名画カード」 – Nagatanien Ochazuke Masterpiece Cards
Nagatanien is a Japanese company that is most famous for its Ochazuke Nori which has a distinctive packaging that you have probably seen before if you engage with Japanese cultural exports on a semi-regular basis. They have been in business since 1952. The company has done brand promotions with just about any IP you can think of, they’ve even done Pokemon cards.
Originally, there was an inspection stamp placed inside the food packaging for their signature item ‘Ochazuke Nori’ to signify to the customer that the food had been inspected for quality and safety. Someone at Nagatanien had the idea to use this to promote culture and present important pieces of artistic history into people’s homes. In 1965 the company began to distribute a trading card series called ‘East and West Masterpiece Selection Cards’ that were included inside the packaged food.
Single cards were given out in the packets of Ochazuke, but in an effort to create fairness and a reward for the customer for being loyal to the product, you could send in 20 tickets that came within the packet to receive a full set of the series in return. Due to popularity, this was changed to 15 tickets but became a lottery system to keep up with demand. Approximately 2400 sets were being given away each week. Creating chase cards was something that was considered at the time, but ultimately they decided against it as the motivations was to spread Japanese culture into the home, rather than create disparity between the works of art. The cards are so recogniseable to Japanese folk that 60% of people surveyed stated that they recognised the cards from their childhood.
The company ended up releasing 10 series of these cards between 1965 and 1997 depicting the works of ‘Hiroshige’, ‘Kitagawa Utamaro’, ‘Sharaku Toshusai’, ‘Katsushika Hokusai’, ‘Renoir’, ‘Van Gogh, and Gauguin’, ‘Manet, Cezanne, Degas, Seurat’, ‘ Photographs of the Silk Road’ ‘ Takehisa Yumeji’, and finishing up the 10 series with ‘Festivals of Japan’
The sets were released in intervals leading all the way up to 1997, when the initiative was shelved due to fulfilling its goal of increasing brand recognition for Nagatanien, having received more than 5 million applications for card sets in the 33 years it operated for. Due to fan demand and a growing interest in Japanese culture internationally the first set was reprinted in 2016 and once again given out via lottery to those who sent in the requisite proof. 1000 sets were given out per month.
Currently, there are no announced plans to either reprint the remaining 9 sets, or if anything new in the series is going to be made. These are very collectible sets of cards that are, generally, easy enough to find in their full sets and original boxes.
Happy collecting!