Amid Rise in Bear Attacks, Businesses Take Steps to Protect Workers; Sprays and Bells Are Selling Well

The Yomiuri Shimbun

2:00 JST, November 14, 2025

Some companies are drawing up safety manuals and reviewing work arrangements to protect employees as bear attacks continue across the country. Other businesses are struggling to meet demand for bear deterrents. Railway operators are grappling with the threat the creatures pose to train services.

As part of safety guidelines it formulated, FamilyMart Co. on Monday began displaying warning messages on in-store digital signage screens at its about 10,660 convenience stores across Japan. The message urges people to watch out for bears. If a bear is sighted, customers will be urged to quietly take shelter in the store or a vehicle, and employees will halt all outdoor work.

“We put top priority on ensuring all our employees and customers have a shared safety awareness,” a FamilyMart public relations official said.

Companies in the non-life insurance industry, in which employees frequently leave the office to meet clients, are allowing more flexible working arrangements.

Mitsui Sumitomo Insurance Co. had previously prohibited the use of company cars for traveling to and from work. But from this month, Mitsui Sumitomo Insurance will let employees use such vehicles for commuting, and also fully pay the parking costs for its company vehicles.

Aioi Nissay Dowa Insurance Co. also has instructed employees who could possibly encounter bears while traveling to or from work to flexibly use work-from-home options.

More train services affected

In regions where bears have frequently been sighted, some factories have taken steps such as affixing barbed wire and noise-emitting sensors to fences to prevent the creatures from entering their grounds.

Railway companies, which have been plagued by instances of bears wandering onto tracks and disrupting train services, need various countermeasures to deal with a wide range of bear-related problems.

According to East Japan Railway Co. (JR East), cases of trains suspending operations or being delayed by 30 minutes or more due to bears occur every year. However, while 11 such cases occurred in fiscal 2024, the figure had skyrocketed to 71 between April and October this fiscal year.

JR East said its officials in charge of track and equipment inspection and maintenance operations in the Tohoku, Kanto and Koshinetsu regions will be provided with bear repellent spray and bells. However, as things stand, preventing collisions between bears and trains remains a thorny challenge. “It would be tough to implement such sweeping measures,” JR East President Yoichi Kise said.

Sales surging

Cainz Corp., which operates about 250 hardware stores in Japan, has reported growing sales of items such as repellent spray and bells intended to scare off bears across the nation. At one store in Fukushima Prefecture, sales of such goods in the past month or two have on average been about quadruple the sales from the previous year.

Other hot sellers include solid pest repellents, firecrackers and pistols that emit a loud sound to scare away birds. “Products that had met a limited market have been purchased for personal protection by people of all ages in many areas,” a Cainz official said. “Some stock is running low because supply couldn’t keep up with demand.”

Sales of repellent spray and bells at DCM Co.’s home improvement centers across Japan have increased, on average, about 30% from the previous year.

“Sales of such goods settle down from the latter half of October and November in a typical year, but demand has remained strong this year,” a DCM official said. The company is prioritizing the supply of such products to regions where bear sightings are frequent, but some shortages have yet to be resolved.