Yakult Visit

Yakult developed the market of probiotic fermented milk drinks (hereinafter probiotic drink) and, consequently, holds the higher brand recognition in the relevant market, to the point that other brand’s product are usually referred to as Yakult by final customers.

Yakult developed four different distribution channels: home delivery by independent sellers, exclusive stores, supermarket chains, and dairy stores of milk products. In this distribution structure, Yakult offers the same product in different presentations and at different wholesale prices between their distributions channels, but maintains the same minimum retail price. Most favorable conditions were granted to independent sellers, which accounted for a huge proportion of Yakult’s total sales income.

Q1. As Yakult is an easily deteriorating product, how can Yakult make sure the whole supply chain including manufacturing, distribution and transportation is good enough to handle this perishable product?

Today Yakult investigate the important steps which ensure that they deliver the highest quality products to the customers. The Yakult manufacturing has strict procedures in place to guarantee that the quality of the products is never compromised.

Yakult’s International Organization for Standardization products and services how their products and services meet the highest international food manufacturing standards. The policies and procedures are also independently audited as regular part of the accreditation process.

Testing at the on-site quality control area ensures that every bottle of Yakult and Yakult light contain 6.5 billion probiotic bacteria; the unique Lactobacillus casei strain and also guarantee a product of the highest integrity.

The commitment to quality extends beyond the manufacturing facility through each stage of the distribution process to stores, ensuring the cold chain to stores is uninterrupted. In practical term this mean the temperature in the Yakult refrigerated vans and transport delivery vehicles is below 4 ℃.

Yakult staffs are committed to giving the best service possible. Their highly trained sale team work at supermarket level to ensure that product is not out of date or damaged and the Yakult fridges are clean.

These are all vital steps in Yakult quality process. Therefore, they can ensure the quality of product during the manufacturing and transportation.

Q2. There are similar products of Yakult in the probiotic product market. They are similar with the bottle size and design. How can Yakult confront with the competitors? What is the positioning of Yakult in Hong Kong to have a sustainable development?

Yakult is a premium probiotic cultured milk-like product made by fermenting a mixture of skimmed milk with a special strain of the bacterium Lactobacillus casei strain Shirota. From the perspective of preventive medicine, Yakult has included its range of products from food and beverages to cosmetics and pharmaceuticals using probiotics. Yakult is not only a pioneer of probiotics but has since become the world’s leader in this field against the competitors by providing varieties of probiotics products, e.g. Yakult Light, and different packaging in different countries all over the world. As Yakult is produced locally, the highest quality and freshness of Yakult sold in Hong Kong can be ensured. Yakult continues its healthy journey to spread to all Hong Kongers about the awareness on the benefits of its unique probiotics, L.casei strain Shirota with the principles of Shirota-ism.

Q3. Why Hong Kong has less flavors of Yakult than other regions? (Singapore has original, orange, grape, green apple)?

When the Company first introduced Yakult in Singapore in 1978, there was a competitor called ‘Vitagen’, which was introduced in Singapore in 1977 and the first company in Singapore to offer a probiotic milk drink with the similar functions as Yakult. Therefore, in order to compete with the competitor, the Company introduced Yakult with different flavors other than original one such as green apple.

Nowadays, there are many flavors of milk drinks in Singapore. For example:

Yakult		Vitagen
Original Flavor		Original Flavor (LB Flavor)
Grape Flavor		Grape Flavor
Orange Flavor		Peach Flavor
Apple Flavor		Apple Flavor
		Original Flavor (LB Flavor) with Collagen
		Rose Flavor with Collagen
		Elderflower Flavor with Collagen

Q4. Does the demand of Yakult vary throughout the year and how do you forecast and manage the production accordingly?

As the business of Yakult is developing continually in the world, Yakult is sold in more than 30 countries around the world and more and more people recognize the benefits of drinking probiotic milk drinks such as Yakult. Thus, the demand of Yakult continually increases. Especially in China, the demand of Yakult increases so many Chinese people come to Hong Kong to buy Yakult. Nowadays, the daily sales of Yakult are 30,000,000 bottles on average around the world.

To forecast the demand and manage the production in Hong Kong, there are more than one hundred employees going to the retail stores around Hong Kong to collect data of the demand. Then, the data about demand collected and integrated help the Company decide how many bottles of Yakult to be produced.

Q5. How to deal with increasing demand in mainland chain?

In order to deal with the increasing demand in mainland china, Yakult is driving up the production of its premium probiotic cultured milk-like drink at its Tianjin facility in China to ensure meeting the growth opportunities. Yakult has to double the production to 1.2 million bottles per day by May 2013 from current capacity of 600,000 per day. Moreover, the Tianjin production plant is only one of three Yakult production plants in China. Under the three production plants, Yakult can produce a total of 4.2 million bottles per day, as to meet the demand in mainland China.