Dimplex Japan
Bringing white goods to electronics powerhouse Japan must have been a daunting prospect, even for Ireland’s Glen Dimplex Group, the largest electrical heating company in the world. Equally daunting was the task set by its subsidiary, Dimplex Japan: convince local consumers to replace an array of heating devices and electric carpets with a single appliance.
The problem: why just heat the air around you when you can keep an entire room toasty? The answer: an electric heat-storage unit. The device consumes electricity overnight when rates are cheapest, storing the energy in specially formulated bricks for the next day. “It’s a 24-hour heating system. So that means the fabric of the home — the walls, floors and ceiling — gets heated well,” says Seiji Kasama, CEO of Dimplex Japan since April 2006. “You can enjoy the same heat as if going outside in the sunshine.”
Kasama started selling Dimplex products 13 years ago in Hokkaido with distribution agent Globally, a subsidiary of homebuilder Matsumoto Kenko. In 2004, the Glen Dimplex Group established its first Japan office as a joint venture with Globally. Then in 2007, it assumed 100% ownership, retaining Kasama to head operations.
Dimplex’s main product, the electric heat-storage unit, can be up to 1.5 meters wide, 67 cm high and 25 cm deep, and is a serious space investment for the average Japanese home. But over the years, Kasama has seen a gradual shift in customers’ attitudes.
“When I started to sell those products in the north of Honshu, people asked, ‘How come we need to install such huge heating appliances?’ But now people have definitely accepted them, even in Kyushu in southern Japan,” says Kasama.
Dimplex Japan’s partnership since 1997 with the Panasonic group has been key. Its heat-storage units cost ¥500,000 when installed – not the type of product customers will normally order from a catalogue. Thanks to Panasonic, Dimplex Japan was able to reach customers via homebuilders and housing manufacturers who included the heat-storage units as part of home sales packages.
The arrangement also fit Panasonic’s needs. “Their group manufacturers don’t have this product. But they need our heat-storage units to promote all-electric concept homes in Japan,” says Kasama.
Dimplex has earned a 40% market share of such heating units in Japan. However, with 25% of their total sales in Hokkaido, and 70% of total sales heat-storage units, the company knows it must diversify.
“This is our biggest challenge at the moment,” says Nobuhiro Asai, Dimplex Japan’s director of business development. He explains that the overall market for heat-storage units will shrink in coming years due to a push toward more energy-efficient products. “If we continue at our current level with the current products, even with a 70% market share in three years our turnover will be the same,” he says. “So to survive and develop, we need more than that.”
The company is positioning its heating system as an alternative to portable electrical devices or wall-mounted air-conditioner-cum-heater units. “We don’t have central heating systems or anything like that in Japan, so we have to educate consumers,” says Kasama. A typical Dimplex heating system comprises a heat-storage unit, panel-heating units for the bedrooms, a heat pump with electric boiler to distribute the energy in water form, and a piping system to connect it all together.
This year is crucial for the company, says Asai. The company is conducting feasibility studies in Hokkaido, with plans to launch a full-scale field test on heating systems there next winter. “Next year will be the time to reap the fruits of our labour,” says Asai.
“Last year at this time the economy was very difficult and people’s minds shrank. But this year people are thinking more positively. And with the new government in power, more attention is being paid to environmental and global-warming issues.”
Dimplex Japan hopes to tap current sentiment with environmentally friendlier products. For example, the electric heat pump, of which the Glen Dimplex Group is Europe’s largest producer, takes heat from air, water or ground sources and outputs four times the energy it consumes. “Global warming concerns will be a big chance for us,” says Asai.