SHARING OUR LOVE OF
JAPANESE BEAUTY FOR
OVER 100 YEARS.
We believe skincare should bring out the very best in you.
Which is why we provide the
very best ingredients.
Rooted in Japanese tradition,
KITAO has been a leader in
cosmetics industry since in 1919.
For over a century, we’ve made it our mission to provide skincare that is clean, organic, and true to our Japanese roots.
OUR TIMELINE
In 1919, our founder started Kitao with the idea that customer trust is at the core of our business, and we have spent over a century building on that belief.
the start of our legacy
1919
Our founder, Kunishiro Kawabata, began in the cosmetics industry in Japan over a century ago. We got our start in the Japanese beauty scene with talcum powders + cosmetic creams and have been improving our skincare formulas ever since.
expanding internationally
1921
Just two years later, we were already ready to join the foreign trade market and began shipping products to customers worldwide.
becoming kitao + overseas
1930-1933
A decade after opening our doors, we officially established ourselves as Kitao Cosmetics Co. (a name you may recognize now as our parent company, Kitao USA), and opened our first cosmetics factory in overseas.
branching out to manufacturing
After half a century of improving our own formulas, we realized we could further share our magic by opening a cosmetics outsourcing company, BISHO Chemical Co. With the opening of BISHO, we found other cosmetics companies were just as excited to work with us as our loyal customers had been for the past 50+ years.
1972
welcoming our CEO
In the 1980s, we appointed our current CEO, Kiyoshi Kawabata to lead our team at Kitao. It’s been more than three decades with Kiyoshi Kawabata propelling us forward in cosmetics, and as he says himself, “We never stop pursuing to innovate new products by thriving to be creative.”
1988
award-winning
leaders in the industry
1988
Kitao’s long history of excellence in the Japanese cosmetics industry earned us an award from the Governor of Osaka Prefecture, Mr. Masaru Kishi, for our decades of work improving the pharmaceutical and health world.
100 year celebration + ULTA BEAUTY
We celebrated our 100th birthday the best way we know how- Getting more products we love to our customers who have followed us on our journey! In 2019, we launched our Kitao products at Ulta Beauty and expanded our Kitao family even further.
2019
2021
2021 and beyond
We are now proudly Kitao USA, Inc. and looking forward to the next 100 years of high-quality, organic, Japanese beauty. Thank you for following us on our journey!
