Consumer-oriented Management | Social Value

Basic Approach

Maruha Nichiro Group's basic mission is to be “a corporate group that aims to be an essential part of society by improving everyone's daily life with wholesome, safe and healthy food,” based on the Group Philosophy.

The Group, which promotes consumer-oriented management, is committed to listening to and making the most of the voice of the customer, realizing sustainable initiatives, complying with laws and regulations, and ensuring that each of us acts with a firm awareness of our role in order to remain an enterprise of value to our customers.

Declaration of Consumer-oriented Management

The basic mission of the Maruha Nichiro Group is to be an essential part of society by improving everyone's daily life with wholesome, safe and healthy food.

In addition to endorsing “Consumer-oriented Management” promoted by the Japanese Consumer Affairs Agency, we have announced our management policies rooted in our Declaration of Consumer-oriented Management established in March 2018. We also publish activity reports on a regular basis.

Consumer-oriented management is defined as activities that improve value for society through co-creation and collaboration with consumers. The three activities that form the pillar of this are as follows.

Listening and utilizing everyone's voice
Measures for future and generations
Adhere to laws and regulations and strengthen governance

We believe this is a true reflection of our Group Philosophy and is linked to our medium- to long-term vision of striving towards a sustainable society. As such, we have announced our Group Slogan, Vision, and Action Policy as Declaration of Consumer-oriented Management.

Medium-term Sustainability Management Plan (FY2018-2021)

Promote Consumer-oriented Management

Targets: Maruha Nichiro Group (Domestic)

Department in charge: Maruha Nichiro Corporation Consumer Relations Center

Target	FY2021	Medium-term Management Plan Self-Assessment
Achievements cultivate corporate culture based on top commitments and facilitate organic communication between departments	Hold ongoing training seminars on Consumer-oriented Management Continue to participate in various lectures by industry groups and enhance systems through mutual exchange of information with the Consumer Affairs Agency Promote activities with related departments involved in product development/ improvement/ enhancement based on the “voice of the customer”	Conducted consumer-oriented management training sessions for all Group employees, with participation by approximately 4,500 employees Held training sessions for all Group employees to consider the relationship between customers and their own business activities through the experience of listening to the voice of the customer at the Customer Relations Center. Enhanced systems through participation in various lectures by industry groups and by mutual exchange of information with the Consumer Affairs Agency Held product improvement review meetings once a quarter and made 38 improvements and enhancements	★★★★☆ Continued to hold training seminars on consumer-oriented management Built telecommuting systems Developed a chatbot on the website Improved and enhanced products by using the voice of the customer
Improve the provision of information to customers and mutual information exchange	Improve customer satisfaction through effective use of systems Contribute to the improvement of customers' eating habits through distributing information booklet to consumers Evaluated and analyzed the “voice of the customer” information, identified risk information at its early stage, and notified and called relevant departments	Revamped the Customer Relations page of the website to make it easier to read and layout Added a fish sausages category to the chatbot established on the Customer Relations page of the website From the perspective of nutrition education, distributed approximately 1,800 consumer information booklets to cooking classes, baseball events, daycare centers, etc. jointly with other companies Evaluated and analyzed the “voice of the customer” information every week, identified risk information at its early stage, and distributed information to relevant departments

Target

FY2021

Medium-term Management Plan Self-Assessment

Action Plan (Key measures)

Achievements

Achievements cultivate corporate culture based on top commitments and facilitate organic communication between departments

Hold ongoing training seminars on Consumer-oriented Management
Continue to participate in various lectures by industry groups and enhance systems through mutual exchange of information with the Consumer Affairs Agency
Promote activities with related departments involved in product development/ improvement/ enhancement based on the “voice of the customer”

Conducted consumer-oriented management training sessions for all Group employees, with participation by approximately 4,500 employees
Held training sessions for all Group employees to consider the relationship between customers and their own business activities through the experience of listening to the voice of the customer at the Customer Relations Center.
Enhanced systems through participation in various lectures by industry groups and by mutual exchange of information with the Consumer Affairs Agency
Held product improvement review meetings once a quarter and made 38 improvements and enhancements

★★★★☆

Continued to hold training seminars on consumer-oriented management
Built telecommuting systems
Developed a chatbot on the website
Improved and enhanced products by using the voice of the customer

Improve the provision of information to customers and mutual information exchange

Improve customer satisfaction through effective use of systems
Contribute to the improvement of customers' eating habits through distributing information booklet to consumers
Evaluated and analyzed the “voice of the customer” information, identified risk information at its early stage, and notified and called relevant departments

Revamped the Customer Relations page of the website to make it easier to read and layout
Added a fish sausages category to the chatbot established on the Customer Relations page of the website
From the perspective of nutrition education, distributed approximately 1,800 consumer information booklets to cooking classes, baseball events, daycare centers, etc. jointly with other companies
Evaluated and analyzed the “voice of the customer” information every week, identified risk information at its early stage, and distributed information to relevant departments

Management Structure

Based on the "Maruha Nichiro Group Quality Assurance Policy", each Group company has established a quality assurance system tailored to its business field based on a common approach.

Moreover, we reflect customers voices in our quality assurance activities.

Quality Assurance Structure

Main Initiatives in FY2021

Disseminate Consumer-oriented Management throughout the Company

The Maruha Nichiro Group has established an internal promotion structure for all employees to understand and take action based on Consumer-oriented Management. We conducted training seminars on Consumer-oriented Management as well as promoted the strengthening of business activities that incorporate the “voice of the customer”.

In FY2021, we conducted training on Consumer-oriented Management using an e-learning program with around 4,500 Maruha Nichiro employees taking part.

In the quality control reconfirmation campaign implemented by all employees of the Maruha Nichiro Group, we carried out a survey on the Company's products to share and utilize their opinions as consumers within the Company.

Meanwhile, we aim to improve our products and services based on the “voice of the customer” we receive on a daily basis, and in FY2021, we were able to accomplish 38 improvements and upgrades.
As our initiative on food safety and security, we have continued to extrapolate potential issues based on the “voice of the customer” and shared them in weekly newsletters.

Further Deepening Communications with Consumers

We are enhancing the provision of information through our website and other means to achieve further mutual communication with our customers. We also ask our customers to fill out a "Satisfaction Survey" in an effort to improve the service we provide to our customers.
Our activities on making full use of the “voice of the customer”product improvement are highlighted on Maruha Nichiro's website as well as an intranet for employees. We plan to continue these improvement activities in the future.

In December 2019, we launched an official corporate account on the Q&A site “Yahoo! Chiebukuro” to answer customers' various questions related to our products.

Since August 2020, Maruha Nichiro introduced an automatic response chatbot on its website on a trial basis to answer customers' questions 24 hours a day, 365 days a year.
(Initially, canned foods, bottled, and frozen food categories were covered, but a fish sausage category was added in February 2022.)

In FY2020, we established a system that allows employees to answer the phone at home during the COVID-19 pandemic, and we are continuing our efforts to ensure that our customer service is not compromised under a variety of circumstances.

We are doing our part to earn customers' trust through activities including initiatives on food safety and security, environmental activities, and food education activities.

Looking Ahead

As a corporate group that brings value to customers, the Maruha Nichiro Group aims to be an essential part of society by improving everyone's daily life with wholesome, safe and healthy food and contribute to everyone's affluent lives and happiness. We aim to further promote consumer-oriented management based on this Group Philosophy.