Hospitality, Accompanied — The Form of the Non-Alcohol Agency Business

Why Sun&R.Lab chose to hold an "accompaniment business"

Sun&R.Lab runs three businesses in parallel: the Maison Brand business (the product brand, NEIGE & THÉ), the Non-Alcohol Agency business, and the BizDev business. In this entry, we would like to write about the middle of the three — the form of the Non-Alcohol Agency business — with the honesty of the Discovery phase.

Why, in the first place, did Sun&R.Lab choose not merely to make a maison brand, but to hold a business that accompanies food-and-beverage and hospitality operators in the field? The reason lies in a gap in the industry that we have been observing.

From Suntory's June 2024 survey and IMARC Group's market forecast, it is becoming widely shared across the industry that the non-alcoholic beverage market has entered a period of qualitative transition. Yet when we listen to food-and-beverage and hospitality operators in the field, we hear many voices saying it is hard to devise concrete moves in response to this change. "The age of the non-alcoholic is apparently here, but I don't know what to source." "I put it on the menu, but I don't know how to make the case for it to guests." "I don't know how to price the non-alcoholic." "I don't know how to propose it to inbound guests." These are not the problems of individual venues — they are the problem of a domain whose know-how has not yet been organized as an industry.

To fill this gap with the Maison Brand business's product supply alone would be difficult. Judging so, we chose to hold the function of accompaniment — the Agency — independently within the organization.

The five areas of the Agency business

The Agency business's support divides broadly into five areas. Each is designed as a concrete move directly tied to the profitability of the field.

Area 1: Attracting guests. We design measures to draw in new customers, matched to the brand world of the venue or facility. Tasting events, terroir experience gatherings, collaboration dinners; cross-industry collaborations; advertising on Instagram, X, and elsewhere; the preparation of multilingual content for inbound guests. As the Japan Tourism Agency's Q1 2025 survey shows, experiential consumption by visitors to Japan continues to gain depth. Demand for "a taste experience obtainable only in Japan" is beginning to become a tailwind for the Agency business.

Area 2: Raising average spend. Menu design and pairing-course proposals to lift the average spend of existing customers. The design of 3-to-7-course non-alcoholic pairing menus, proposals combining bottle and glass, pricing design toward the luxury band, the design of a refresh cycle for seasonal menus. IMARC Group forecasts a 7.7% growth rate for the market as a whole, but the growth rate of the high-price-band non-alcoholic market is expected to exceed it. "Whether to treat the non-alcoholic as a cheap substitute, or to position it as a luxury product" — this strategic choice is entering a phase where it directly governs a venue's profitability.

Area 3: Monetization. Support for building revenue channels beyond food and lodging. Launching an e-commerce site, developing original products (bearing the venue's brand label), designing a retail corner, measures to raise LTV (subscription, community, membership). NEIGE & THÉ also has the assembly of OEM (original product development) within its sights, and we take on consultations — in the form of individual discussion — on matters such as label design matched to a venue's world, and recipe development using particular materials.

Area 4: Team-building. Support for assembling the optimal team for a venue's or facility's challenge, drawing on Sun&R.Lab's network. Introductions of sommeliers and chefs, collaboration with local governments, access to producer networks, introductions of related operators (design, PR, photography, video production). Precisely because Sun&R.Lab is itself a small organization, the depth of its external partner network forms a competitive advantage for the Agency business.

Area 5: DX and creative. Support for operational efficiency through the introduction of IT tools, and for creative work that raises brand value. Selection of reservation systems and customer-management tools; logo, website, and merchandise production; design of menu books and pairing-explanation materials; the design of social-media operation. This is the area where the technical knowledge cultivated by Sun&R.Lab in the BizDev business intersects with the brand-design knowledge cultivated in the Maison Brand business.

The manner of accompaniment — STEP01 through STEP04

The Agency business's support is designed to proceed in four steps.

STEP01: Interview and tasting (about one day). While listening to the brand world of the venue or facility, the character of its cuisine, its current challenges, and its guest profile, we propose and offer for tasting the items best suited from within NEIGE & THÉ.

STEP02: Test introduction (from a minimum of six bottles). The chosen items are introduced first at the smallest lot. We verify, in the field, guest response, the operational load on service, and the expression in the menu book.

STEP03: Two-week review. We confirm post-introduction performance data (order rate, average spend, guest feedback), and make the decision on full introduction and the optimization of the menu.

STEP04: Support for attracting guests and monetization. After full introduction, we provide the support across the five areas on a continuing basis. Original-label production, retail expansion, event planning, social-media operation — we accompany the measures for maximizing revenue.

STEP01 (interview and tasting) can itself be carried out in as little as a few days. Including through STEP02–03 (test introduction and the two-week review), we ask for roughly three to four weeks, so that guest response can be judged in the field. We take care to design the entrance low, so that it can be tried with ease.

Maison Brand and Agency — the complementarity of two businesses

The Agency business is not independent of the Maison Brand business (NEIGE & THÉ); the two stand in a structurally complementary relationship.

The "philosophy of product design called terroir" and the "producer network" that the Maison Brand is nurturing become the foundation on which the Agency business generates value in the field of the venue. Conversely, the tangible feel of the food-and-beverage field and the points of contact with production regions gained in the Agency field flow back into the R&D of the Maison Brand. Each supports the other, and the other supports the one in turn — not a startup-style "pivot" relationship, but a relationship of separate branches growing from a single root.

In the course of Discovery, we are currently advancing dialogue with several food-and-beverage operators and production regions. We are not yet at the stage of naming specific clients or particular cases; we are at the stage of weaving relationships from here. This entry, too, is written with the caution of the Discovery phase, as a note sharing the "present-moment blueprint" of the Agency business.

To local governments and tourism associations

The reach of the Agency business does not stop at individual venues. From the standpoint of regional tourism promotion and specialty-product branding, too, Sun&R.Lab's Agency business has room to be of use, we hypothesize.

To integrate a region's producer network into NEIGE & THÉ's recipes, and to deploy those products at luxury hospitality facilities within the region — this can become a structural initiative that raises the brand value of a region as a whole. As can be seen in the Digital Agency's "DX Promotion Plan for Local Governments", co-creation with external specialist operators is becoming an important theme in the tourism and regional-branding domains of local government. Sun&R.Lab hopes, as one such co-creation partner, to build up dialogue with local governments and tourism associations as well.

Comprehensive support that includes regulatory and compliance response

When a non-alcoholic drink is newly introduced to a menu, response to regulations such as the Food Sanitation Act, the Food Labeling Act, and the Act against Unjustifiable Premiums and Misleading Representations is unavoidable. In the Agency business, we provide appropriate information and introductions to the necessary specialists in these legal and compliance areas too.

NEIGE & THÉ advances its product development with a design that clears the provisions based on the Food Labeling Act — ingredient labeling, allergen labeling, nutritional labeling, best-before labeling. At the start of sales, our policy is to deliver in a state where legal compliance has been confirmed. When the venue side creates a menu book or product guidance, we check together for expressions that pose no legal problem. We also support against risks of brand damage: avoiding gray expressions that could contravene the Pharmaceuticals and Medical Devices Act, such as "effective for health" or "cures"; and reviewing expressions requiring care under the premiums-and-representations law, such as "ultra-cheap" or "now only".

Weaving one evening's experience over the long term

The final destination of the Agency business is, we believe, to build together with venues a structure that weaves "one evening's experience" over the long term.

A single glass of a non-alcoholic drink can become the moment that sets the saturation of an entire night's memory. To receive anew the guest's "choice not to drink" not as something lesser but as an experience of equal standing. The accumulation of that will slowly change a venue's brand value and its rate of return — such is the vision of the future we hope to draw together with our co-creation partners.

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In the next entry, we write on the terroir strategy of "region and material" that supports the root of the Agency business.