I’m sure Mr. Sugano also depends on those mass-produced consumer goods as well, but when it comes to to his Aero Concept products, he has never come close to thinking of producing them on a mass scale in order to make some money.
Sugano: “Why, I wouldn’t want something like that myself. I started making this stuff because I wanted it for myself, so what would the point be to make something I wouldn’t want? These days, things like dishes, handbags, electronics, there isn‘t much difference between one product and another. I don’t think so anyway. That’s why the user has other ways of finding value in things. That could be the brand history, the recognition level, the quality, the carefully selected materials, the sophisticated level of customer service, or a long warranty. But, all those things are all ends to a means, aren’t they? You can take all that, mash it up and make the perfect system, but if there’s no birth parent, there’s no value to the product, is there? Personally, I’m not interested in something like that. That’s why I make what I want. If I can make something that I like, I’m satisfied. If someone likes something I’ve made and buys it from me, I’m even more satisfied. It’s very sad when an object has no birth parents.”
But, when pressed on exactly how Aero Concept was developed, Mr. Sugano is reluctant to talk.
Sugano: “On Saturdays and Sundays, when I had free time because there was no work, I used my extra time and extra materials and made it a little bit at a time, stopping along the way, then making a bit more, and so forth. Even though it was extra materials, it still cost money. I’m using the same materials that go into making airplane and shinkansen parts, so it really is expensive. I was using those expensive materials, so I couldn’t make a lot at one time. That’s why I enjoyed myself, getting this far this week, making up to that point next week. This month I don’t have money for materials, so I’ll leave it for now. It was like that.”
Research about design and technique were clearly done in this weekend handyman style, naturally attained. Read the brand policy that Mr. Sugano had a friend write for him when Aero Concept went public and it’s unclear, yet still somehow explained how the brand came to be.
Sugano: “This product policy was written up about seven years ago. When I think about it now, I think it’s a little off. Suzuki, you’re a professional writer. Could you take a look and give me some ideas?”
With this, Mr. Sugano showed me the following paragraph. As far as I could tell, being in a position to distance myself and look at it from an objective point of view, it certainly doesn’t present Aero Concept as a brand in a clear way. However, it does convey how the normally cool Mr. Sugano was passionately pursuing the “things I want for myself” when the project was founded.
Aero Concept is a product development and sales business targeting the end user with products made using industrial production expertise and planning and design skills honed over countless years in the business making airplane parts for companies such as Boeing and Airbus. The policies of the products we make are, high quality processing skills, accuracy, and manufacturing that spares no effort. After over two years of accumulated design and research about processing techniques, the product concept is “Airplanes – Outer Space – Atmosphere.” The products made will be mainly furniture, interiors, briefcases, lighting fixtures, sports products, and more. This is not merely design for design’s sake, but manufacturing sprung from an airplane shop. We’re making a new design style that has not been seen before. These products will be fitting of something coming from a place where the world of 1/1000mm processing and play/skill/prescision; processing with a playful heart come together to make a product. We’d like to meet the end-user through this kind of manufacturing.
Aero Concept.
This is the firm, but steeped in joy, policy of we craftsmen.
By reading this paragraph, it’s possible to learn a number of things about the brand. It’s a brand with high quality processing skills and accuracy. They are dedicated to manufacturing without sparing any effort. The brand design for Aero Concept took about two years. He wanted to bring together a sense of fun and everyday use as “manufacturing sprung from an airplane shop.” And so on. Even if Mr. Sugano doesn’t like his product policy, it does present several clear points. The behind-the-scenes story of the start of Aero Concept is certainly not the stuff of TV documentaries, full of clamour and disagreement, devastating setbacks and soaring glories. The reason for this is that basically Sugano himself was the only person involved in the development of the brand. Of course, Mr. Sugano had the help of the skilled craftsmen in the workshop, but the work was basically carried out in his own slow, meandering way. That’s why there are no meetings, let alone any project progress schedule management or budget. It was development of a brand by a weekend handyman.
Sugano: “Even so, you can’t really say it like that. I do have some ten-plus staff here. Some of them were against it. Their main job is to make these internal components for airplanes and shinkansen trains, and I started making this weird other stuff. Yes, well, even so, in my case, I just mumbled along to myself and worked on my projects. I figured I’d get it eventually.”
I’m very sorry for the readers who were hoping for some kind of climax and denoument to this tale, but the tale of the development of Aero Concept has absolutely no legendary qualities to it whatsoever. Well, it’s not that it’s not legendary. The legend is going on inside Mr. Sugano himself even now. “Not like that, this is better. No, I should do it this way. If I get this person to help, it’ll work out.” This meditation-like internal process and actual physical labor comes together and takes form, going out into the world. He digs down into the well inside him and arrives at the thing he wants for himself. It isn’t passed through anyone else’s filter. When he reaches the limits of his technical ability, he has the suppport of skilled craftsmen, but at the base of it all, Mr. Sugano decides everything according to his own tastes. Currently, the Aero Concept lineup is all born from Sugano’s personal aesthetic sensibility. Now, what kind of preferences does this Sugano have, and what kind of education, what kind of things was he surrounded in as he grew up? This naturally becomes the next point of interest.
