UCC canned coffee became famous nationwide at the 1970 Osaka Expo and was a huge hit.
The UCC Coffee with Milk from that time is still on sale today and is a symbolic UCC product.
As the name UCC Ueshima Coffee suggests, UCC was founded by Mr. Ueshima, and its origins date back to 1933 when Ueshima Tadao Shoten opened in Kobe.
It seems that it was common in 1933 for a store name to include the president's full name.
At the time, they didn't sell coffee, but Western food ingredients like butter and jam. Kobe was a trading port and had been home to many foreigners since the Meiji era, giving the city an exotic atmosphere, so perhaps this was an influence.
Eventually, they began selling coffee as well.
The early Showa period was a time when Western restaurants and coffee shops were on the rise and coffee was often served there, so Ueshima Tadao Shoten began roasting coffee beans and wholesaling them.
When the Pacific War began in 1941, coffee was deemed a "luxury item" and an "enemy drink," and imports were halted in 1944.
Coffee imports resumed in 1950, after the war ended.
At that time, Ueshima scraped together around 186 bales (approximately 11 tons) of coffee by bartering for items such as used bicycles.
With this capital, Ueshima Coffee Co., Ltd. was founded in 1951.
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