NEW YORK—Despite a string of expensive problems, Asahi Shuzo Co. continued its risk-taking ways and started brewing the renowned Dassai sake brand in New York state, its first overseas production base.

A number of challenges remain, but the company is forging ahead with its new sake brand named Dassai Blue, which will be released in the United States this summer.

“We hope Dassai Blue will be superior to the original Dassai sake made in Japan,” said Hiroshi Sakurai, chairman of Asahi Shuzo.

The sake is named after the old Japanese saying that goes, “Blue dye from the indigo plant is bluer than indigo.”

The most expensive Dassai Blue is expected to cost between $90 and $100 (12,000 yen and 13,400 yen) for a 720-milliliter bottle.

The brewery plans to produce over 100,000 liters this year and increase the volume by more than 10 times over the next few years.

“We aim to have our sake served not only at Japanese restaurants but also at general eateries in the United States,” Sakurai said. “Our rivals are not other sake brands but wine and champagne.”

In March, the company’s rice mill and brewery were completed on the 60,000-square-meter site of a former supermarket along the Hudson River in the town of Hyde Park, about a two-hour drive north of New York City.

“We decided to produce sake in New York as a base for disseminating our culture, but we are still searching our way around the U.S. market,”

Sakurai said. “Every day presents new challenges that require us to make new experiments.”

SERIES OF MISTAKES

Facing a shrinking Japanese market, Asahi Shuzo decided to build a brewery in the United States in 2017, with production initially scheduled to begin two years later.

But a host of troubles emerged.

At first, the company planned to use a California rice brand called Calrose, but the variety did not lead to the desired sake. The company decided to import Yamada-Nishiki rice from Japan for the time being.

Then the COVID-19 pandemic spread, hampering construction work. The company also had to buy additional equipment to meet local regulations on wastewater treatment.

The brewery was finally completed in March this year after four years of delay and an investment of 8 billion yen, nearly triple the planned 3 billion yen.

Asahi Shuzo’s sales for the past year were around 16.5 billion yen. This means nearly half of the company’s revenues were invested in the single U.S. plant.

A man who runs a Japanese restaurant in New York said: “They spent 8 billion yen on a New York brewery alone. I wonder how many years it will take to recover the investment. I’m worried about them.”

But such concerns do not deter Sakurai because this is how he has expanded his business.

NOTHING TO LOSE

Sakurai took over Asahi Shuzo in 1984, when the company was producing inexpensive sake for the local market in a depopulated area of Yamaguchi Prefecture.

Annual sales gradually decreased and fell below 100 million yen. Eventually, the “toji” (chief brewer) quit the company, leaving only four employees to handle production.

Sakurai then took the company in a different direction.

Asahi Shuzo entered the premium sake business by producing “junmai daiginjo,” which is made of highly polished rice.

Although the company did not have stable production technology at the time, Sakurai decided to take a chance.

He later took the company on another adventure by entering the Tokyo market.

“I could make those decisions because we were losers with no way out. We had nothing left to lose,” Sakurai said.

He added that the small workforce made it easier to unify the team’s ideas.

“We made sake in small quantities through trial and error and repeated the process over and over. This led to a rapid improvement in quality,” he said.

Junmai daiginjo is now the flagship sake of the company.

At Asahi Shuzo, scientific data is more important than the intuition of chief brewers.

The use of machines to control temperature enabled year-round production, which allowed the company to keep prices low and gain popularity.

SMALL TEAM IN NEW YORK

The New York brewery is now working on growing Yamada-Nishiki rice in Arkansas state. It plans to gradually transition from imported Japanese rice to the U.S.-grown grain.

Asahi Shuzo is entering the unknown American market with a small team.

Three veteran sake brewers from Japan were sent to New York. Five local staff members joined the team.

Sakurai and his wife also moved to New York state on March 20 and are living near the brewery.

“I’m 72 years old and don’t even speak English,” he said.

And he is ready to take another chance.

“We need further experimentation to produce sake in the United States but are also trying to find our way for sales. We have no choice but to try various things,” Sakurai said.

“This is why we will definitely make some mistakes, but jumping into the U.S. market will help us understand it better than just thinking about it in Japan.”