Do you know Swan Bakery & Café in Japan

In 1998 Mr. Masao Ogura, a former president of Yamato Transport Co., Ltd., distressed by the low wage of the physically/mentally challenged people in the quasi-charity facilities selling low margin products, established Swan Bakery & Café which sells what customers want and pay the premium.

This movement could be done when the economy was that good, having several shops in the expensive locations e.g. Ginza the company may not have reached the breakeven and the motive therebehind might to some degree be triggered by the PR plan about Yamato and Takaki, a Hiroshima based bakery company, which supplies the dough to the B&C all over Japan.

But the value of this idea survives the time: a company earns more when it sells what customer wants and pays even more thereby the employees earn more.

We can revisit the facilities where the people with disabilities work and see how they are profitable and if not how they can be profitable. The companies with strong brands seem really well positioned to give those with disabilities the chance to earn more as the products/services get more margins.

Next time I am in Japan, I would like to go to the B&C and see how the idea of Mr. Ogura thought up over 10 years ago has become of today.