Why a Village? | The “Circle of Trust” Value Village Wants to Bring Back
Why do we call ourselves not a “shop,” but a “Village”?
The answer is simple. What we want to bring back is something that once existed in villages: a circle of trust.
There was no room for deception in a village
Imagine an old village. The person buying vegetables knew the face of the person selling them. The tofu maker’s work was proven by the taste each morning. If someone sold something bad, the whole village would know by evening. That is why makers did not cut corners, and the people who used their products could choose with confidence. Faces were visible, voices could be heard, and deception did not work. That was the economy of the village.
What about shopping today? The faces of makers are hidden behind advertising, and the standards for choosing have become image and name recognition. Products are chosen based on assumptions, and because people do not truly feel a difference, they switch to something else. In a world that was supposed to have become more convenient, only trust has been left behind.
Rebuilding the trust of the village online
Value Village is a challenge to create this circle of trust once again, this time online. That is why every part of our system is built on the principles of a village.
Faces must be visible. We tell the stories of makers without hiding them. We travel across Japan, discovering the treasures of makers who create good things but do not know how to sell them, and deliver those products to customers together with their backgrounds. This is why our series “VILLAGE Report” travels through the 47 prefectures, calling each one a village.
Voices must be heard. In the Value Village Community, we ask members to try products for free and publish their honest impressions just as they are, whether they are compliments or tough feedback. Customers are not simply buyers; they are co-developers. They are residents of the village.
Deception must not work. We compete not through the image created by advertising, but through the real feeling people get when they use the product. We discuss this resolve in detail in another article, “ Neuroscience, Not Placebo. ”
47 villages, and one more village
Japan has 47 prefectures, and in every one of them, there are products, techniques, and services worthy of global pride waiting to be discovered. We search for them, refine them, gather them in this online village, in other words “+1 VILLAGE,” and deliver them across Japan, and someday to the world.
At the center of the village is not sales. It is increasing the number of people who can share joy together. When people who make good things are rewarded, people who encounter good things are delighted, and that joy is passed on to someone else, this cycle begins to turn. At that moment, it is no longer just an e-commerce site. It is a village.
Please become a resident of this village, too. Value Village Community Its doors are always open.
—The Value Village Editorial Team. The full picture of our philosophy is available in our Corporate Charter, “ The Book of Value.”
