How two brothers turned their struggling family business into an international name

Even as youngsters, Kuni and Tomo Hijikata believed that their business was worth fighting for. Established at Nagoya, Japan back in 1936, the Hijikata family's foundry made of cast iron was renowned for its extreme precision. However, by the time it was in the early 90s its future uncertain. Being the inheritors of the long-running company, Kuni and Tomo knew it was up to them to preserve their casting iron manufacturing process intact.

At the time, both brothers were employed in Toyota and Toyota Tsusho However, they saw an opportunity to design cast iron cookware that would be passed down through generations. So, the brothers quit their full-time jobs to go completely focused on the preservation of the family company. They trained on the floor of the foundry as artisans before launching the company in 2010. Vermicular was created. When their first cast iron pot went on the market, the demand exceeded the 15-month backorder, fueled largely through enthusiastic word-of-mouth.

10 years on 10 years later, the Vermicular team is setting their targets for expansion across the globe, currently offering their goods in China, the U.S., China, and beyond. To better communicate the worth of their cookware to new, international markets, Vermicular has invested heavily in video to promote their products. "Without our videos, we'd be having a harder time expanding our business," says Mark Hayashi who is Vermicular's Chief of U.S. Office. We caught up with Kuni, Tomo, and Mark to find out more about Vermicular's strategy to expand globally through video. See their stories above and read the full interview below.

"We always think of our video assets as serve as the extension of our brand and products. Videos are more powerful over writing, and this is especially true in the realm of cooking."   Mark Hayashi, Vermicular's Head of U.S. Office

 What was the process behind this product?

Tomo: "I thought that we could use our firm's cast iron expertise to create enameled cast iron containers that have lids perfectly fitted. There was nothing precedent of this process in Japan. We knew then that we'd need to invent the process on our own.

To learn everything we could, Kuni and I sat at the bottom of the foundry. Kuni was a skilled casting crafter while I became a machinery expert. It took us three years and over 10,000 iterations before we came up with a concept which met our expectations."

 How did you go about setting up your brand to Japan?

Mark: "Brand storytelling has always been the basis of our communications and marketing strategies. Telling stories of our unique history and commitment to craftsmanship was a hit with our customers and made us feel more connected to our customers on a more personal and deeper level.

The first step was to create videos that reflected the mission of our brand. If we are creating a branding story video or how-to-product tutorial ensure that they reflect the person we're. In the beginning, we didn't focus so long on the sales that would be made in the near future, but instead prioritized maximizing customer satisfaction from a long-term view."

 What has been your biggest obstacle in building the Vermicular brand beyond Japan?

Mark: "Our biggest challenge was the barriers to communication. Since the launch of Vermicular in 2010, we've had a lot of challenges. Vermicular brand in the year 2010 and have established a substantial brand presence in Japan but nothing has was transferred to outside Japan. The only thing we had to do was start building the Vermicular brand from scratch, which was challenging and required extensive preparatory work prior to launch."

 What was the first place you invested in order to establish your brand internationally?

 Your content that you've branded is evidently beautiful. How have you achieved this level of quality?

Mark: "We worked with a advertising agency to create the video for our brand and we spent quite some time deciding on the look and feel' of lighting, the casting and clothing as well as food style. Additionally, we took a long time going between us on the creation of video storyboards that became the primary guideline during the entire process, including day of shooting.

Since there are many different people during the shooting, there are almost always unexpected setbacks resulting in onset delays. A solid storyboard that includes a detailed shoot schedule helps establish clear expectations and guide everyone working on the shoot to focus in the same direction. Our storyboards not only become a precise map for our hectic shoot days, it also helped us get through post-production issues. It's particularly important for small-scale brands who have limited funds."

 Which are the best places to invest your production dollars in order to continue expanding?

Mark: "Our hypothesis was the creation of a product-related video with a series of how-to videos to help our customers enjoy all the benefits of an induction cookware. As stated in our brand statement, our mission doesn't stop when our customers make an order for our cookware.

Our goal is to make sure that our customers enjoy cooking with the Vermicular cookware in the longest time feasible. We've seen clear outcomes from these how-to-videos as they aid in the education of cookware owners, but also aid the shoppers get a better grasp of how to use the cookware."

 Has video assisted in building an image for Vermicular globally?

Mark: "Definitely! There's a lot. Our video assets as an extension of our brand as well as our product. While we might not have the most budget, but we spend many hours trying to find the story and the format of the videos that are most effective in telling our story. Visuals always work better over the written word This is particularly relevant in the field of cooking."

 What is the reason why we employ HTML0 to host and embed your video?

Mark: "We prefer for many reasons, with the most important being the customizable options to embed video. It is clutter-free and free of ads. ensures seamless user experiences throughout the website and protects the "touch and feel" of our brand.

also helps us share documents between our teams from both the U.S. and Japan, which makes it easier to obtain feedback, even when you're thousands of miles apart."

 What's next to be the next step for Vermicular?

Kuni: "More innovative products are being developed and we'll continue to expand our product offerings in both the U.S. and across various Asian countries."

Mark: "We are currently planning our video content strategy which includes branded videos with various chefs and farms to product explaining videos, as well as instructional videos that are our key assets for years to come."