Shinagawa Beer: The Lost Brewery That Started It All

Before Asahi, before Kirin, before Sapporo — there was Shinagawa Beer. In the early years of Japan's modernization, a small brewery in what is now Tokyo's Shinagawa ward produced what many consider Japan's first commercially brewed beer. Its story is largely forgotten, but it represents the fascinating, chaotic beginnings of Japan's love affair with beer.

The dawn of beer in Japan

Beer arrived in Japan with the Dutch traders at Dejima in Nagasaki during the Edo period, but it was a curiosity, not a commodity. When Japan opened to the world after 1853, beer began flowing in with other Western goods. The new Meiji government, eager to modernize, saw beer as a symbol of Western civilization.

The first attempts at local brewing were experimental. In the 1860s and 1870s, several ventures sprang up, often led by foreigners or Japanese entrepreneurs who had traveled abroad. The competition to establish Japan's beer industry was fierce, chaotic, and full of failures.

William Copeland's Spring Valley Brewery

In 1870, Norwegian-American William Copeland established the Spring Valley Brewery in Yokohama's Yamate district, near the foreign settlement. This is often cited as the first brewery in Japan. Copeland had learned brewing in the United States and saw an opportunity serving Yokohama's growing foreign community.

The Spring Valley Brewery produced a German-style lager and operated for about 15 years before financial difficulties forced its closure. In 1885, a group of foreign and Japanese businessmen acquired the assets and founded the Japan Brewery Company — which would eventually become Kirin Brewery in 1907.

Shinagawa Beer (品川縣ビール)

Around the same period, attempts at Japanese-led brewing emerged. Shinagawa Beer (品川縣ビール, Shinagawa-ken Beer) represents one of these early, indigenous efforts. Records from the early Meiji period indicate that brewing experiments took place in Shinagawa, which was then a separate ward (ken/prefecture) before being absorbed into Tokyo.

The exact details are debated by beer historians. What's clear is that the early Meiji period saw a burst of small-scale brewing across the Tokyo area, Yokohama, and Hokkaido. Most of these ventures were short-lived — the technology was difficult, the investment was enormous, and the market was still learning to appreciate beer.

The Sapporo story

In 1876, the Meiji government established the Kaitakushi Brewery in Sapporo, Hokkaido. This government-backed venture had a clear advantage: access to Hokkaido's cold climate (ideal for lager brewing), clean water, and potential for growing hops and barley. Seibei Nakagawa, who had studied brewing in Germany, was appointed as the first brewmaster.

The Kaitakushi Brewery eventually became Sapporo Breweries, making it the oldest existing beer brand in Japan. But it wasn't a private enterprise — it was a government project designed to develop Hokkaido and prove Japan could master Western industrial techniques.

Osaka Beer and the founding of Asahi

In 1889, the Osaka Beer Company was established, producing what would become Asahi Beer. The company was formed by a group of Osaka businessmen who wanted to compete with the Yokohama and Hokkaido breweries. Their early products were well-received, and the company grew steadily through mergers and acquisitions.

Why the early breweries disappeared

Most of Japan's early breweries didn't survive for several reasons:

• Scale economies — Beer brewing requires significant capital investment. Small operations couldn't compete with larger, better-funded breweries.
• Refrigeration — Lager brewing requires cold temperatures. Before reliable refrigeration, only breweries in cold climates or with access to ice could produce consistent results.
• Distribution — Getting beer from brewery to customer before it spoiled was a major challenge in the pre-railroad era.
• Tax policy — The Meiji government imposed beer taxes that favored larger operations, driving consolidation.

By the early 1900s, Japan's beer industry had consolidated into what would become the Big Four: Kirin, Asahi, Sapporo, and eventually Suntory. Hundreds of small breweries, including Shinagawa Beer, had vanished.

The legacy

Japan's forgotten early breweries — Shinagawa Beer among them — represent something important: the incredible ambition of Meiji-era Japan. In the span of a few decades, Japan went from having no beer industry to producing world-class lagers. That journey was messy, full of failures, and driven by people who believed Japan could master any craft it set its mind to.

Today, the craft beer revolution has brought Japan full circle. Small breweries are thriving once again, producing innovative beers with Japanese ingredients and techniques. In a way, they're the spiritual successors of those early Meiji-era pioneers who dared to brew beer in a country that had never tasted it.

The next time you raise a glass of Japanese beer — whether it's a crisp Asahi Super Dry or a bold craft IPA — remember that it started with a handful of adventurous brewers, a lot of failures, and a dream. Use barhop.jp to find bars serving great Japanese beer near you.