BAIEIDO | Sakai’s Incense Heritage and the Craft Behind Kobunboku

AI-generated editorial image inspired by Baieido’s Kobunboku incense and packaging.

In Sakai, 300 years isn’t considered particularly old.

Nobuhiro Nakata (16th-generation head of Baieido)

Baieido, a Japanese incense maker based in Sakai, Osaka, has been trading in incense for more than three centuries. Yet Nobuhiro Nakata, the 16th-generation head of the family business, observes that such a long history is hardly unusual in Sakai.

Long prosperous through overseas trade, Sakai became a center of craftsmanship in fields ranging from cutlery and dyeing to incense making. Baieido’s story likewise began with merchants handling fragrant woods and medicinal ingredients brought from abroad. The skills of identifying, blending, and shaping aromatic materials into incense sticks have been passed down through generations, from specialist merchants of the Edo period to the family business of the Meiji era, the postwar factory, and the present day.

Despite its long history, Baieido has never simply preserved its old formulas unchanged. It has continued to refine the fragrance of Kobunboku, an incense it has produced for more than a century, while creating new works intended not only for Buddhist rituals but also for the enjoyment of fragrance in everyday spaces. The decisions about what to preserve and what to adapt reveal much about Baieido’s approach to incense making.

Basic Information

  • Brand: Baieido (梅栄堂)
  • Founded: 1657 (Meireki 3); its origins as a medicinal ingredients merchant date back to the Muromachi period
  • Founding ancestor: Kakuemon Yamato-ya (大和屋覚右衛門)
  • Trading name adopted in 1657: Jinkoya Sakubei (沈香屋作兵衛)
  • Current leader: Nobuhiro Nakata (16th-generation head and President and Representative Director)
  • Place of origin and headquarters: Sakai, Osaka Prefecture, Japan
  • Official website: Baieido

The Founders and the Origins of Baieido

Sakai’s Maritime Trade and the Medicinal Ingredients Merchant Kakuemon Yamato-ya

From the medieval period into the early modern era, Sakai was a trading city where goods from many regions arrived through international commerce. Aromatic woods crossed the seas, including agarwood from Southeast Asia and sandalwood from India. These materials were not valued solely for their fragrance; they were also used as medicines and spices. The trade in fragrant woods was therefore closely connected to merchants dealing in medicinal ingredients.

Baieido traces its own beginnings to one such merchant family. According to the company’s official history, its origins lie in a medicinal ingredients business established during the Muromachi period by Kakuemon Yamato-ya, whom the company recognizes as its founding ancestor.

During the 16th century, incense-stick production became increasingly widespread in Sakai. Unlike powdered incense, known as makko, incense formed into slender sticks could be lit to release fragrance continuously. Merchants familiar with fragrant woods and traditional medicinal ingredients began participating in the production and sale of these sticks.

1657: Becoming an Incense Specialist under the Name Jinkoya Sakubei

In 1657, the third year of the Meireki era, Baieido’s predecessor adopted the trading name Jinkoya Sakubei and began specializing in incense sticks and other incense products. This is the year Baieido recognizes as its founding date.

The title Jinkoya was distinctive to Sakai and was reserved for merchants who specialized in incense within the broader medicinal ingredients trade. Jinkoya Sakubei also became known by the abbreviated name Jinsaku, alongside fellow specialists Jinhachi and Jinwa.

During the Edo period, the use of incense expanded beyond temples as the culture of appreciating fragrance became more widespread. Baieido responded to these changing needs while continuing to develop its knowledge of fragrant woods and preserve its distinctive methods of blending aromatic materials.

In the Meiji era, the business changed its trading name from Jinsaku to Nakata Baieido. It also strengthened its relationships with Buddhist temples, receiving orders from the head temples of various sects. A Sakai commercial and industrial directory published in 1891 records the name Sakugoro Nakata, the head of the business at the time. Although trading names and social institutions changed, the work of making and supplying incense continued.

The 1945 Air Raids on Sakai and the Recovery of the Family’s Incense Formulas

Sakai suffered extensive damage during the air raids of 1945. Many incense manufacturers concentrated in the city were affected, and Baieido lost buildings, equipment, and other facilities.

Yet not everything had been destroyed. Nobuhiro Nakata describes what had been passed down within the family about the company’s postwar recovery:

Even so, the formulas for blending the medicinal ingredients had survived.

Nobuhiro Nakata

According to Nakata, his predecessors rebuilt the business using the surviving blending records. The written formulas did more than identify which ingredients needed to be obtained again. They preserved the methods of composing fragrances that Baieido had developed over generations, providing a foundation for rebuilding the business.

After recovering from the devastation of war, Baieido continued supplying incense to households in postwar Japan. Records from the 1950s show sales activities using company vehicles, while television commercials for Kobunboku were produced in the 1960s. The family business, rooted in traditional incense making, adapted to the changing systems of distribution and advertising in postwar society.

Nobuhiro Nakata: The 16th Generation’s Return to the Family Business

Nobuhiro Nakata was born in Sakai in 1962. He graduated from the Faculty of Commerce at Chuo University in 1985 and joined Itoham Foods that same year. Rather than entering the family business immediately, he began his professional career at another company.

He joined Baieido in 1987 and became President and Representative Director in 2001.

By the time Nakata assumed responsibility for the business, Japan’s incense market was undergoing significant changes. Demand for traditional incense used in Buddhist observances was declining, partly as fewer households maintained a Buddhist altar. Inheriting the family business therefore meant more than safeguarding its long history. It also required considering how that history could connect with new forms of demand.

While continuing to produce traditional incense based on fragrant woods, Baieido began developing incense inspired by familiar everyday aromas, including coffee and green tea. The company also expanded its activities through participation in international trade exhibitions and collaborations with businesses from other industries.

Baieido’s Approach to Incense Making

Blending Agarwood, Sandalwood, and Traditional Medicinal Aromatics

Two of the most important fragrant woods used in incense are agarwood and sandalwood. Agarwood is obtained from resin-rich portions of trees belonging to the Thymelaeaceae family, and its fragrance varies according to quality and origin. Particularly prized agarwood is known as kyara. Sandalwood, by contrast, is naturally fragrant and can be appreciated on its own.

Baieido’s incense, however, is not made simply by grinding fragrant woods into powder and shaping them into sticks. Its fragrances are composed by combining aromatic materials closely associated with traditional medicine and spices, including cinnamon bark, clove, borneol, patchouli, and benzoin.

These ingredients do not all serve the same purpose. Cinnamon bark and clove contribute distinctive aromatic characteristics, while patchouli and benzoin help shape the fragrance’s foundation and persistence within a blend. Another ingredient, known as kaiko, consists of the operculum, or protective lid, of a marine snail and is used to help harmonize and retain fragrance.

Judging the Quality of Aromatic Materials and Their Blending Ratios

Natural aromatic materials vary according to their place of origin, harvesting season, and individual characteristics. Even ingredients sold under the same name do not necessarily possess identical aromas.

Baieido assesses the quality of its materials from the selection stage, comparing the fragrances of different woods to identify those suited to each product. Nakata has also explained that he regularly compares fragrant woods to sharpen his senses and improve his ability to recognize high-quality materials.

In his official message as company president, Nakata expresses the difficulty of this work in a few words:

Incense making is an extremely delicate undertaking.

Nobuhiro Nakata

Combining Handcraftsmanship with Mechanized Incense Production

Baieido’s manufacturing process combines long-established craftsmanship with modern machinery.

Incense production begins with quality inspections of the raw materials. Aromatic ingredients such as agarwood and sandalwood are ground into powder, weighed, and blended according to their formulas. The mixed powder is sifted and kneaded into a clay-like consistency. This prepared mass is known as a tama, or incense dough.

The dough is fed through an extrusion machine, which forms it into slender incense sticks that are cut to specified lengths. The sticks are then arranged on drying boards and left to dry naturally while their alignment and straightness are adjusted. Drying times vary with the seasons. According to Baieido’s official production description, the process takes several days in summer but may require more than ten days in winter.

During drying, the spacing and curvature of the incense sticks are checked and adjusted. Once dry, the sticks are bundled, inspected, and packaged. Maintaining a consistent shape in such delicate sticks requires skills distinct from those involved in blending the fragrance itself.

At the same time, Baieido has invested in mechanization. Its production facilities include computer-controlled blending equipment capable of dispensing ingredients in predetermined proportions. The company has also introduced machinery that handles operations from extrusion to dimensional adjustment within a single system.

Kobunboku: Preserving and Refining a Fragrance across Generations

Among Baieido’s creations, Kobunboku (好文木) is essential to understanding the company’s history.

Kobunboku is another name for the plum tree, derived from a classical Chinese story. Baieido’s Kobunboku is a signature incense that has been produced for more than a century. According to the 16th-generation head, Nobuhiro Nakata, it originated during the time of an ancestor five generations before him.

Kobunboku incorporates natural aromatic materials such as sandalwood, cinnamon bark, and borneol. Its composition combines the character of sandalwood with traditional medicinal aromatics, offering an example of the blending methods that have long been central to Baieido’s incense making.

Nakata explains that the company has maintained Kobunboku’s fundamental fragrance while making gradual refinements in response to changing times. This involves not only continuing to select suitable ingredients but also considering how an inherited fragrance can remain relevant in the present.

Zankohi: New Incense Inspired by Familiar Everyday Aromas

Alongside traditional blends based on fragrant woods, Baieido also creates incense inspired by aromas familiar from daily life.

One example is Zankohi (残香飛), an incense expressing the aroma of coffee. Unlike traditional incense composed around fragrant woods and medicinal aromatics, it draws on the roasted, toasty character associated with coffee and is designed to produce relatively little smoke.

Baieido has also developed incense inspired by green tea and other familiar drinks and everyday sensory experiences, expanding the range of subjects expressed through fragrance.

International Activities and Collaborations across Industries

Beyond its established domestic distribution channels, Baieido has expanded its activities through international exhibitions and collaborations with companies from other industries.

In collaboration with Tezuka Productions, the company created incense inspired by characters such as Astro Boy and Black Jack. It has also produced an exclusive variation of its longstanding Kobunboku fragrance for BEAMS.

References