54｜History of Glassware: About Japanese Glass Manufacturers and Handmade Glass Factories 24

Hello everyone🎵

Following on from last week, I would like to talk about Kamei Glass, which had a tremendous impact on the Japanese glass market and greatly expanded it.

The oldest catalog I have is from 1989 (Showa 64 / Heisei 1).

We talked about the series of Satsuma Kiriko, Edo Vidro, and Nagasaki Glass that Kamei Glass revived.
We also discussed imported items, specifically the French company ARC and the German company Walther. This time, I would like to discuss products from factories in Eastern Europe, specifically the Czech Republic, Slovakia, Romania, and Hungary.

Many of you may not be familiar with the term "former communist bloc." During the Cold War between the US and the Soviet Union, Western Europe, a free-world nation, and Eastern Europe, which was under the control of the former Soviet Union, were referred to as the "communist bloc." There was a strict border control known as the "Iron Curtain" and a military standoff. In business as well, there were various restrictions on trade with communist bloc countries, similar to the economic sanctions currently imposed on North Korea and Russia.

Economically, the former communist bloc was considered to consist of poor countries, and there were strict restrictions on travel, including the obligation to obtain a visa. Even under such circumstances, each country promoted industrial development as a national policy to earn foreign currency, especially dollars. In particular, the former Czechoslovakia was a famous production area for Bohemian crystal, and there were many glass factories and many craftsmen who cut and processed glass throughout the country. In high schools and universities, glass manufacturing technology and research were actively pursued, and I hear that all students were educated about glass as a compulsory subject.

During the Czechoslovak era, the export corporation Glass Export handled all trade on the Czech side, and Meiwa Sangyo, a subsidiary of Mitsubishi Corporation, exclusively handled it on the Japanese side. Meiwa Sales, a subsidiary of Meiwa Sangyo, distributed to department stores such as Mitsukoshi Isetan Takashimaya and department store wholesalers.

After the collapse of the communist regime with the Velvet Revolution in 1989 (Heisei 1), the movement towards separation rapidly progressed, and in 1993 (Heisei 4), Czechoslovakia dissolved its federation and separated into the Czech Republic and the Slovak Republic. As the country split and each glass factory started to handle its own sales and branding, Glass Export inevitably underwent a process of dismantling and transformation. Due to Meiwa Sangyo's exclusive contract, Kamei Glass was initially unable to do business with the various factories, even if the factories wanted to. Meiwa Sangyo, as the exclusive distributor of expensive Bohemian crystal, controlled prices in Japan to secure substantial profits, setting domestic retail prices that were unbelievably high compared to local costs. On the other hand, the factories wanted to sell glass other than expensive crystal to the Japanese market, so Kamei Glass gradually began handling cheaper glass and automated glass that Meiwa Sangyo did not handle.