＜prologue＞
I started a blog called “The Baby Boomer Generation’s Miscellaneous Blog”（Dankai-sedai no garakutatyou:団塊世代の我楽多（がらくた）帳） in July 2018, about a year before I fully retired. More than six years have passed since then, and the number of articles has increased considerably.
So, in order to make them accessible to people who don’t understand Japanese, I decided to translate my past articles into English and publish them.
It may sound a bit exaggerated, but I would like to make this my life’s work.
It should be noted that haiku and waka （Japanese short fixed form poems） are quite difficult to translate into English, so some parts are written in Japanese.
If you are interested in haiku or waka and would like to know more, please read introductory or specialized books on haiku or waka written in English.
I also write many articles about the Japanese language. I would be happy if these inspire more people to want to learn Japanese.
my blog’s URL:団塊世代の我楽多（がらくた）帳 | 団塊世代が雑学や面白い話を発信しています
my X’s URL:団塊世代の我楽多帳（@historia49）さん / X
When I was a child, my mother subscribed to a magazine called “Kurashi no Techo. One article that left a particularly strong impression on me was an article titled “Comparison of oil stoves of various companies by means of ignition experiments. I remember that the editorial department of “Kurashi no Techo” actually conducted experiments and independently evaluated the performance of the stoves in terms of safety, ease of operation, and other factors.
It was something that the “Consumer Affairs Center” would do today, and I think it was an advanced approach at the time.
By the way, a “mail order only” magazine called “Harumeku” has recently become very popular among women in their 50s (housewives). In this issue, I would like to explore the secret of this magazine’s popularity.
１．What is “Harumeku”?
Harumeku is a magazine for women in their 50s and older published by Harumeku, Inc. and is No. 1 in popularity in the “senior women’s magazine” category (215,000 actual copies sold from July to December 2018). It is ranked #3 among all women’s magazines and #6 among all magazines. It is a mail order only subscription magazine not available in general bookstores.
Launched in 1996 as “Iki Iki,” a magazine supporting the way of life and living from one’s 50s onward, the magazine changed its name to “Harumeku” in the May 2016 issue, which marked its 20th anniversary. The concept of the magazine is to “support a spiritually rich way of living and living,” and its editorial policy is to provide truly valuable information to help women in their 50s and older live positively and cheerfully.
Recent feature articles include the following
（１）Smartphones for People in Their 50s: Simple, Convenient Tips for Smarter Use Now
Since 80% of the “Harumeku Generation” (as we call women in their 50s and older) use smartphones, we are planning to “thoroughly resolve questions and confusion that we encounter because we use smartphones” and “introduce simple and convenient tips to use smartphones more wisely and economically than now.
（２）This is how to get rid of a flabby belly in your 50s!
It’s time to start wearing lighter clothes and we are concerned about our stomachs, but for the “Harumeku generation” who don’t want to exercise or restrict their diet, we introduce “5 ways to get rid of flabby stomachs” and “daily habits to get rid of flabby stomachs” without “trying too hard or pushing yourself too hard”.
The magazine seems to have succeeded by focusing on the “Harumeku Generation” and providing articles on matters of high interest to them in a thoroughly understandable and acceptable manner. The magazine provides articles that precisely match the needs of the Harumeku generation with pinpoint accuracy.
Women’s magazines” and ‘general magazines’ that target a wide range of subscribers tend to be ‘all-inclusive’ and fall into the trap of being ”too short for the belt and too long for the sash.
２．What is “Kurashi no Techo”?
Kurashi no Techo is a general lifestyle magazine for the home, first published in September 1948 as “Beautiful Kurashi no Techo” (renamed “Kurashi no Techo” in December 1953).
A magazine called “Your Life” modeled after “Kurashi no Techo” also appeared in the NHK morning drama “Toto Nehchan” in the first half of 2016.
The main feature of Kurashi no Techo over the years has been its “product tests. Other major content included articles on fashion, food and beverage, cooking, and medical and health-related topics aimed at housewives.
Although the “product test” ended in 2007, it contributed to improving the quality of Japanese industrial products during Japan’s period of rapid economic growth.
In the “product test in which a fire broke out in an oil stove,” Kurashi no Techo argued that a bucket of water was sufficient to extinguish the fire in the early stages, and was at odds with the Tokyo Fire Department, which instructed people to “put a blanket over the stove.
The results of the test at the Fire Research Institute of the Fire Department proved that the opinion of “Kurashi no Techo” was correct.
３．Reasons for the success of the two magazines
(1) Narrowing down the readership
(2) Editorial policy of specializing in articles of interest and concern to the target readership
(3) Selecting and choosing information to avoid generalizing.
(4) Provide easy-to-understand explanations that are easy for the target audience to understand.
Regarding this last point (4), I would like manufacturers to keep this in mind not only for such magazines, but also for “instruction manuals” (commonly called “torisetsu”) for computers, smartphones, and new electrical and electronic devices.
This is a serious problem, especially for “elderly” and “mechanically-challenged” people like us. Yukichi Fukuzawa said, “Good writing is writing that even a monkey can understand,” and I would like you to aim for “torisetsu that even a monkey can understand” and “concise, easy-to-understand, and clear explanations.
As Japan becomes a “super-aging society” in the future, I believe that the need for “concise, easy-to-understand explanations that focus on the latest technology and information that everyone wants to know” will increase even more than in the past.
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