Blind Enthusiasm in Japan

This is Greg's account of a trip to Japan, and how we came to sell Blind Enthusiasm beer across the ocean.

I had the amazing opportunity to travel to Tokyo in March, 2026 to attend FoodEx, a remarkably huge expo showcasing food from all over the world. The trip was facilitated by Alberta Agriculture; as a brewery we’re a processor of local agricultural products so we qualified to join the trade mission. I didn’t sample our beers at the Alberta booth, but instead I set up a number of meetings in and around Tokyo with importers that were interested in our beer.

Before leaving Canada I worked my contacts and gathered a list of importers to meet in Tokyo. What I didn’t know at the time is a lot of them went to FoodEx because my meetings were all at their bars and shops. All of the Japanese importers and distributors I met owned bars and/or bottle shops where they sold products they imported. What was also interesting about my experience is that all of the folks I visited were far from central Tokyo and I made road trips in every possible direction to the city’s suburbs. I had quite a bit of fun exploring the city through craft beer shops.

After meeting with four different importers I had a very clear leading candidate to bring our beer to Japan. BC Beer Trading expressed a big interest in bringing in our beer and we were excited to work with them so a deal was struck! One reason why things worked out with BC Beer Trading is that we already had a connection with one of the partners, Hiroshi, as he works as a brewer in Vancouver. Not only had he already done a tour of our brewery in Edmonton, but Doug also did a collab with him in Vancouver. With this connection in hand I met wit his partner, Tatsuya. I visited him in Matsudo City, a suburb just outside Tokyo, at their shop, Beer Owle.

One thing we’ve learned is we always lead with the beer. People don’t really fully comprehend what we do until they try it. So, for the visit with Tatsuya and his team we brought a selection of beers to try: Spontaneous Manifesto, One Night in Sicily, and Un Petit Peu. I think we also had Fruitful Pursuits; Apple but didn’t try it that day. We had a great tasting session and everyone really liked the beer. They liked it so much they wanted to take the beer to their friend’s nearby restaurant, Craftbeer & Wine PeeTa (see photo) to get another opinion. As I expected their pals also liked the beer and that really locked things in. We agreed to work together and have since signed a contract for BC Beer Trading to be our exclusive importer to Japan and we have just started selling beer there!

Blind Enthusiasm was created to not only serve the local Edmonton and Alberta market, but as an active international exporter. We have a goal of sending our beer all over the world and have been working for years to make this happen. Having beer on sale in Japan is a true culmination of a decade of work. It’s been really exciting to see the Japanese social media feedback flowing over the last couple weeks proving that our dream really has come true. We’re also really excited to be working with the team at BC Beer Trading. They have a true passion for beer and we’re working together to build a business together selling our beer in Japan!

Kanpai" (乾杯)!