Masafumi Tomita, Business Unit Manager, Personal Foods Division, House Foods Corporation

Thinking from the customer's perspective is the secret to long-lasting love

Business Unit Manager, Personal Foods Division, House Foods Corporation  Masashi Tomita(Tomitama Masafumi)

■ Profile
Joined House Foods in 2001. Until 2007, he was involved in the development of various products, including stew mix, in the research and development department. Since 2008, he has been in charge of various brands such as "Umakacchan," "Tongari Corn," and "Maroni-chan" in the planning department. Since 2025, he has been in charge of retort curry.

House Foods continues to produce many long-selling products in a wide range of fields, focusing on curry roux such as Vermont Curry and ready-to-eat curry such as Curry-ya Curry. Masafumi Tomita, Business Unit Manager of the Personal Foods Division, designs the entire process from the brand direction of ready-to-eat curry to the point where it reaches consumers. We spoke to him about the process of creating products that continue to be loved by people of all ages and genders.

I've always been interested in food-related matters, and had the opportunity to study food at university in the Faculty of Agriculture. I also like making things and coming up with ideas, so I wanted to work in development and planning, and so I started job hunting. I applied to food companies, mainly to research institutes for food-related technologies, and ultimately chose House Foods. The reason for this was that at the time they were dealing with a wide range of products, not just curry, but also beverages (now sold), snacks, ramen, and more, so I thought it would be interesting to be involved in the development of a variety of products.
At first, I was assigned to the research lab, where I worked on actually turning proposals into reality. After seven years, I joined the planning department at the Tokyo headquarters and have been involved in product planning ever since. I like making things with my hands, so when I was first transferred, I was worried about whether I could handle the gap between my work and the new responsibilities I was assigned. However, both jobs had the same goal of creating better products to please customers, so I was able to continue despite the differences in approach.

■ The greatest joy is when it reaches the customer

I manage the business unit in charge of retort curry. Specifically, my main job is to think about product development, brand promotion, naming, package design, profit management, sales routes, etc., and work with each department to bring them to fruition. It feels like I'm designing the entire process from the planning stage to when the customer picks up the product.
I plan things together with my team members and deliver products to customers, so the thing that makes me happiest is seeing something that I have thought up and created with various departments go out into the world and be used by customers. When a brand that I was involved in from the ground up for the first time was on the shelves of a store, I even went to the store to see customers buy it. I saw that customers had picked up the product and put it in their basket, and then I went home relieved. (laughs)

■What I keep in mind when coming up with ideas

When coming up with ideas, it's hard to find a sure answer. I do surveys of customers, but I'm not the target audience, and since it's only a survey, I don't know everything. For example, if I were to serve seniors with the food, there are many things I don't know because I have no real experience of the lives of senior citizens. However, I don't think I could create something if I left it unfinished. The important thing is how much of what I don't know I can fill in the gaps with my imagination. Also, if I leave it at just my imagination, I won't be able to explain it to others. To turn an idea I came up with into a plan, I need to convince others, so I need to supplement my imagination with numbers and data to explain it. That's why I try to balance the imagination with the numbers, and be able to explain both.
I don't think ideas just come to you out of nowhere. But they don't come to you if you just sit at your desk thinking about them all the time. What I try to do is to first think about the basis of the idea. Then, in your daily life, you'll suddenly be able to pick up hints that you hadn't noticed before. First, think about the problem. And if you keep that in the back of your mind, it will give you the opportunity to notice a new perspective.
Another thing I do is dig deep into things that may seem unrelated at first glance. I sometimes come up with ideas for designs and names, but oftentimes completely unrelated knowledge broadens my horizons. For example, things I studied in school that I thought would be useless in the workplace can sometimes prove useful. That's why my department is home to many people who are highly interested in a wide variety of things. Even in meetings, we set aside time to share and dig deep into things that may seem unrelated but that interest us. I also encourage the person who made the proposal to be the one to think about the topic first, in order to create a foundation for thinking. If someone comes up with an idea, I dig deep into why they thought it was good. There must be a reason why they thought it was good. This helps me see what's important, and once I decide that this is the key to the product, I consider how to utilize its features to commercialize it.

■The challenge of being a product creator

I'm currently in charge of ready-to-eat curry, and while I think it's very useful to society, I'm sad that there's a trend in society that says, "ready-to-eat is good enough." So I want to get people to say, "ready-to-eat is good," rather than, "ready-to-eat is good enough." Compared to when I joined the company, I think that advances in technology have made ready-to-eat curry taste much better. I want to produce products that communicate the value of ready-to-eat products, and create a brand that will remain with us long after I retire. That has been my goal since I joined the company.

■Message to university students

Once you start working, it's hard to find time to study purely. When I was a student, I used to wonder, "Will this knowledge really be useful when I enter society? I wish I could learn more practical knowledge." However, you often have no choice but to learn practical knowledge once you enter society. Conversely, once you start working, you won't have time to study truly academic knowledge. That's why I think it's better to study what you can now and then enter society. That knowledge may be useful in completely unrelated fields that you never expected, so I recommend studying a variety of subjects to broaden your horizons.

Interview with Student Newspaper Online on September 24, 2025 by Ishii Seizo, a first-year student at Musashino Art University

Ochanomizu University, 1st year, Ieda Arisa / Showa Women's University, 2nd year, Abe Rurika / Information Management and Innovation University, 2nd year, Yamada Chiharu / Musashino Art University, 1st year, Ishii Seizo