KAMOI KAKOSHI CO., LTD.’s “mt” masking tape for stationery and miscellaneous goods is a popular brand with fans throughout Japan and overseas.
With more than 1,000 varied designs, it never fails to delight its fans. It is also a popular souvenir from Kurashiki.
Events where people can experience mt are held throughout Japan, and the company continues working to build its fan base.
The department that connects mt with its customers is KAMOI KAKOSHI’s “Consumer Division.” It is essentially a sales department, but its work covers a wide range of activities.
We spoke with Tokizane Yukino, a young employee in her second year at the company (as of May 2025), about what makes mt and KAMOI KAKOSHI CO., LTD. so appealing.
The information presented here was accurate when this article was published in May 2025. Please note that it may differ from current information.
About KAMOI KAKOSHI CO., LTD.
KAMOI KAKOSHI CO., LTD. is a long-established Kurashiki company that manufactures and sells industrial adhesive tape, adhesive tape for stationery and miscellaneous goods, and insect-trapping products.
Around the middle of the Taisho period, imported flypaper was circulating in Japan, but it was expensive and had not become widespread in ordinary households. In response, the company created “Kamoi Flypaper”—flypaper with quality that could compete with foreign products and a price anyone could afford.
In 1923, Kamoi Toshiro founded “Kamoi Flypaper Manufacturing Works,” the predecessor of the company. Kamoi Flypaper became popular soon after it went on sale and was exported to the United States and various parts of Asia. The company went on to develop a succession of new insect-trapping products.
As Japan’s sanitary conditions improved over time, demand for flypaper declined. The company therefore launched a new business manufacturing adhesive tape, making use of its adhesive-processing technology. Its expertise in adhesion, developed through making flypaper, became its strength, and it manufactured a variety of adhesive tapes for painting, construction, sealing, and other uses, becoming an important supplier to tradespeople on the job.
The “mt” masking tape for miscellaneous goods first went on sale in 2008.
Three women contacted KAMOI KAKOSHI CO., LTD. to say they wanted to tour its masking tape factory. The company picked up on their idea of “It would be great to have tape like this” and turned it into the mt we know today.
mt won a Good Design Award in 2008 and has since become a major hit for KAMOI KAKOSHI CO., LTD., with fans throughout Japan.
KAMOI KAKOSHI CO., LTD. has incorporated customer feedback into its products in every era. Its history reveals the company’s flexibility and drive to improve.
Tokizane Yukino, who handles sales for the hugely popular “mt”
Tokizane Yukino works in the Consumer Division, which primarily handles the mt business. Born in 2001, she is from Hyogo Prefecture.
Tokizane went to university in Shimane Prefecture. While job hunting, she considered returning to her hometown in Hyogo Prefecture, but ultimately joined KAMOI KAKOSHI CO., LTD., which makes the masking tape she had loved since childhood.
When asked, “Were you worried about moving for work?” she replied, “I’d been away from home since I went to university, so I wasn’t too worried about moving to an unfamiliar place. Kurashiki has both nature and a city, and just the right number of people, so it’s comfortable to live in, and I like it!”
What does the Consumer Division do?
The Consumer Division, where Tokizane works, has two main areas of responsibility.
The first is sales activities with retailers and distributors that carry mt. This mainly involves visiting stores to ask about popular products and introduce new ones.
mt is sold at nationwide variety-store chains such as Loft and Hands, as well as at stores such as Usagiya, a large stationery retailer in Okayama Prefecture. Tokizane’s territory covers all of the Chugoku region: Okayama, Hiroshima, Tottori, Shimane, and Yamaguchi. It shows just how much mt is loved throughout Japan.
The other responsibility is planning and running events organized by the company. mt events are held almost every month throughout Japan.
In Kurashiki City alone, events include the annual major event “mt factory tour,” as well as collaborations with Kurashiki Ivy Square and JR Kurashiki Station, entertaining fans. The “mt factory tour” is especially popular, sometimes attracting more than 10,000 visitors, depending on the year.
Selling event-exclusive mt designs and holding workshops where participants make large torn-paper collages with mt are among the ways the Consumer Division, where Tokizane works, creates experiences that delight fans.
Now in her second year at the company, Tokizane sometimes takes the lead in planning events. “I’m getting more opportunities to take on work at an early stage, and I find it rewarding,” she says.
How Tokizane joined KAMOI KAKOSHI CO., LTD.
Tokizane says she has loved masking tape since she was a child.
The first masking tape she picked up, when she was in third grade, was a striped design with two colors, muted red and blue. It quickly became her favorite stationery item. She would wrap it around pens and use it for her summer vacation projects—in fact, she stuck masking tape on just about everything.
She became increasingly fascinated by masking tape and continued collecting products from various manufacturers from childhood. By the time she was a university student, she had amassed more than 100 rolls at home.
According to Tokizane, that is still a small collection compared with those of passionate fans. It shows just how much masking tape captivates its fans.
Tokizane began job hunting in the summer of 2023. Wanting to “return to my hometown in Hyogo and work,” she initially aimed to become a civil servant in Kobe.
Unfortunately, the civil-service path did not work out, but Tokizane then thought, “If I’m going to work, I want a job I find enjoyable, one that lets me be involved with things I love!” The first thing that came to mind was the masking tape she loved.
She focused her job search on manufacturers and trading companies that handled masking tape and stationery, and eventually found her current role at KAMOI KAKOSHI CO., LTD.
Tokizane says she was impressed during her interview by how enthusiastically the employees talked about their work. She felt, “Maybe I could enjoy working here just like everyone else,” and chose KAMOI KAKOSHI CO., LTD. from among the three companies that offered her a position.
After joining the company, she was shocked to discover that the first masking tape she had bought as a child was made by KAMOI KAKOSHI CO., LTD.
Not only sales, but also designing mt
The Consumer Division’s work covers a wide range of activities. It also includes designing mt products sold exclusively at events.
Several mt designs were also born from Tokizane’s ideas.
The stamp-design mt that particularly caught the writer’s eye was sold at “Paper Expo in Okayama,” where a wide variety of stationery is gathered. Okayama specialties are printed with a retro texture, creating a design that combines the “feel of a stationery event” with “Okayama character.”
The vivid floral mt was created in response to a designer request for “something that looks like a collage made with a single roll.”
There are ways to combine masking tapes with various patterns, and the collage-style design makes it even easier to enjoy them.
Tokizane says, “I’m an mt fan myself, so I think about designs I’d want from a fan’s perspective.”
Tokizane says mt’s greatest appeal is the wide variety of patterns, with more than 1,000 types. Its exceptional adhesive strength and durability are also among mt’s attractions. These are made possible by the technology developed by KAMOI KAKOSHI CO., LTD., which has manufactured flypaper for many years.
What Tokizane sees as appealing about KAMOI KAKOSHI CO., LTD.
Tokizane says the company’s greatest appeal is that it is very proactive about creating new things.
mt itself, when traced back to its origins, was created in response to customer requests. She says the company has no resistance to new initiatives and, rather, has an atmosphere that encourages it to flexibly create new things.
The company’s flexibility in incorporating opinions extends not only to customers but also to employees. Even in her second year at the company, Tokizane finds it easy to offer her opinions during meetings and other discussions.
Another appealing aspect of KAMOI KAKOSHI CO., LTD. is that it has many approachable employees, not just in the Consumer Products Department.
For event work, employees sometimes work together across departments. “Even people from other departments are quick to help whenever I’m having trouble, and they explain things carefully when there’s something I don’t understand. I feel there are a lot of kind people here,” she told us.
She also said that she has more opportunities to meet employees from the Osaka and Tokyo branches in person at events than online.
Tokizane joined KAMOI KAKOSHI CO., LTD. and entered her second year there in 2025. We spoke with her about the joy of working surrounded by the mt she loves.
KAMOI KAKOSHI CO., LTD. Company Information
| Organization name | KAMOI KAKOSHI CO., LTD. |
|---|---|
| Industry | Manufacture and sale of industrial and insect-trapping products / masking tape for stationery and miscellaneous goods |
| Representative | Kamoi Takashi |
| Year established | 1923 |
| Address | 236 Katashima-cho, Kurashiki City, Okayama Prefecture 710-0805 |
| Contact | 086-465-5811 |
| Website | KAMOI KAKOSHI CO., LTD. |
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