An Intriguing Little-known Investment: Single-Plank Wood (Part 1)
In Part 1 of this dialog between Yuki Sakaguchi, CEO of WONDERWOOD Inc., and Kay (Kosuke) Kato, President and Investment Evangelist of WealthPark Lab, Sakaguchi touches on episodes from his childhood while describing the appeal of WONDERWOOD’s single-plank wood and the Japanese craftsmanship that has underpinned an intimate bond between wood and people.
Yuki Sakaguchi, CEO, WONDERWOOD Inc., was born in Tottori Prefecture. After graduating from university, he joined P&G Japan Limited, where he worked in sales. Later, he was entranced by a one-piece wooden table in a local café he had just happened to wandered into. In 2016, Sakaguchi launched WONDERWOOD Inc. and introduced single-plank tables and counters to private homes, hotels, and restaurants. Today, guided by its mission of “Back to Nature,” the company manufactures and sells products that give people a sense of nature.
Kay (Kosuke) Kato, President and Investment Evangelist of WealthPark Lab conducts research and disseminates information to “open new investment doors for all.” He has been in his current position since 2021.
Click here for Kosuke Kato’s profile
Single-plank wood also has value as a spiritual investment
Kato: Today, I’d love it if you could share with us the little-known charm of single-plank wood. At WealthPark Lab, we are dedicated to investment that creates wealth and happiness for people and society, and WONDERWOOD’s single-plank wood products provide more than just interior design; they are unique in that they have value as both an economic investment and as a spiritual investment that connects people to nature, and I got the feeling that they are intimately connected with our activities. First of all, can you tell us what single-plank wood is?
Sakaguchi: A piece of single-plank wood is simply a single plank of wood cut from a giant tree. We buy the choicest single-plank wood from all over Japan, make them into tables and counters, and sell them to private homes and commercial establishments. The single-plank pieces in our gallery are from trees that are 100 to over 300 years old, but you are unlikely to see trees that old in everyday life. Single-plank wood is cut from trees in virgin forests, satoyama (countryside forests), or temples that have been around for a long time. Sometimes trees that were originally village’s symbol or a temple’s sacred tree are cut down because of poor management or some other problem and end up as the source of the wood.
Kato: I see. So, these fascinating single-plank pieces that surround me now were not from man-made forests, but from virgin forests. What kind of process turns these trees into one-piece furniture?
Sakaguchi: First, the tree is felled. Then, we cut the logs into large planks using special saws and machines. Next, depending on the species and thickness of the tree, we dry the cut planks for 5 to 10 years, and when the moisture content is below a certain level, we process them meticulously and then start selling. In our case, we sometimes stock in raw logs that have already been distributed, and sometimes we get single planks that have been pre-dried, so conditions at the time we stock them in vary.
Kato: By the way, how do you set the purchase price and sales price of a single-plank board?
Sakaguchi: It’s hard to see from the outside, isn’t it? In fact, I myself, who had no background in the lumber industry, had a very hard time understanding how single wooden planks were priced in the industry. So, at WONDERWOOD, we decided to create our own formula to calculate the price of a single plank in a reasonable way based on the species of wood and the size of the plank. The number of wood species used for furniture is somewhat limited, so we decided to set an approximate unit price for each size of these species and put the system into operation. Now, regardless of which employee calculates the price, it’ll be about the same, so we’ve settled on a transparent way to determine the prices.
Also, although it’s common in the lumber industry to raise or lower prices based on the existence of splits or holes in the wood, we view these as the “personality” of the wood and our basic principle is not to reflect those in the price. The idea is that the value of the tree as a tree is separate from people’s tastes, even though each customer may have his or her individual preferences. However, we do sometimes use our own discretion when we price rare wood that will never be seen again, or wood that has a rare complexion.
In elementary school, my mom didn’t let me carry a school bag. This was a formative experience in daring to take a different path from other people.
Kato: I can understand why some customers might prefer a board with splits and holes if they’re going through the trouble of buying a single piece of wood. If they don’t like it, they could just buy a processed one.
Sakaguchi: That’s right. Customers’ tastes really do vary from person to person. Way back, right after I launched the business, we had an opportunity to hold an exhibition at a gallery in Shibuya, where we put 30 single-plank boards of different species and finishes on display. We put together the widest variety of single-plank pieces imaginable, some with chainsaw cut marks, some with holes, and some that had been cleaned up perfectly. We put a large, expressive piece in the center of the gallery as the centerpiece, and displayed the rest in order of how popular we thought they would be.
But when we asked people after the show which piece was their favorite, no two of them gave the same answer, and only one person chose the piece that we had featured. This was a huge surprise to us, along with being a valuable lesson learned from trees — namely that “by nature, people’s tastes and preferences are very diverse.”
We often walk the path of uniformity: from childhood, we carry our school bags along with everybody else, and then when we leave high school or college and start working at a company, we all wear suits. Even when we go out into society, our individuality as people tends to be hidden. However, when we ran a test where we asked people their favorite tree, the results were the exact opposite of uniformity. No two pieces of wood are the same, and in the same way, we were able to reaffirm that no two people are the same, and a strong individuality lies in all of us.
Kato: That’s an interesting anecdote. As I listened to your story, I also thought that in fields like art and wine, where we have accumulated more information, people might get caught up in popular assessments and be unable to give their preferences as frankly as they could for a piece of wood. Looking at single-plank wood may be an intriguing opportunity to take a look at yourself.
Our aim at WealthPark is to create a society where people can give expression to their individuality in their life and work styles, and the word “alternative” is important here. You could define it as “new” or “substitute,” but we believe that the word “alternative” also means “having personality” or “having something different.” I suppose the skill to be able to sense what you like — like picking out your favorite plank of wood — in your own way as you please, even as you age, will be a necessary condition for a mature society.
Sakaguchi: That’s true. By the way, I wasn’t allowed to carry a school bag in elementary school [laughs]. It was an ordinary home — my dad was a civil servant and my mom was a housewife — but for some reason, my mom didn’t like the idea of me having the same school bag as everyone else. Instead, she gave me a burgundy shoulder bag. Well, when I started school, I got teased a lot by the other kids for that reason.
But when I reached the higher grades, now everyone disliked those school bags, and they started imitating me. This was a very valuable experience for me, and now I think my mom taught me that if you show your own personality as different from everyone else first, then the times will catch up with you. I have taken a different path from other people, like picking Ghana in Africa for studying abroad when I was a student, and starting up a business in the lumber industry, and I think the root of this lies in that school bag experience. When I told my mom how grateful I was to her, she had forgotten all about it though [laughs].
The intimate bond between wood and people in Japan has been underpinned by craftsmen who use the right tools for the materials
Kato: Your “alternative” successes, all accomplished unfettered by the values and common sense of people around you, have made you what you are today, haven’t they? By the way, are there also one-piece furniture markets or cultures overseas, like the one in Japan?
Sakaguchi: Yes, they have them all over the world. For example, an Italian solid wood furniture brand called RIVA1920 makes tables using wood from New Zealand Kauri trees that are thousands of years old. Single-plank wood is popular not only in Europe but also in Asia, and many scenes in Korean TV dramas show one-piece wood tables.
However, compared to wood from other countries, Japanese wood is unique in a good way. Japan has a climate with four distinct seasons, which makes it easy to get annual ring lines and rich complexions. Also, because Japan doesn’t have long sunlight hours and it takes time for trees to grow, many of its trees have high wood density. Japan also has a unique variety of tree species and colors. For example, we have many types of cherry trees that come in a variety of shades, from white and red to ash. So, when you go to choose that single piece of wood for your furniture, I think you’ll have fun looking for the one you like the best.
Kato: I myself have a single-piece wooden dining table introduced to me by WONDERWOOD, and it has changed my view of wood. I’d never been aware of it before, but now when I walk in the park or hike a mountain, I’ll pay more attention to the thickness and species of the wood, and its complexion.
Sakaguchi: I’m so glad to hear that. Japan is not only blessed with a rich variety of unique lumber, but also has an exceptional culture of craftsmen who know how to use this lumber the right way. Just as a sushi chef can’t make a delicious fish into delicious sushi unless they are highly skilled, the bond between wood and people in Japan has been underpinned by the craftsmanship of artisans who know how to use the right tools on outstanding materials. As large as the world is, there is probably no other culture in it where wood is as much a part of everyday life as in Japan. The fact that so many Japanese last names are written with the kanji character for wood also speaks to the close relationship between wood and people in Japan.
On the other hand, I am concerned that as new materials are being created to replace wood in the construction sector, we will lose this craftsmanship that has fostered Japan’s wood culture. Since our inception, WONDERWOOD has been committed to having craftsmen do as much of the work as possible, and we’d like to take part in preserving this wonderful culture, in our own humble way.
(Part 2)
