The first time beer was brewed in Japan was around 1812 by a Dutch merchant, named Hendrik Doeff. He started a brewery in Dejima of Nagasaki since his supply of beer from Europe was cut off by the Napoleonic wars.

That brewery is no longer in operation, but the oldest brewery that is still in business started out as Kaitakushi Brewery in Hokkaido in June of 1876 with Seibei Nakagawa, who had recently returned from studying beer making in Germany, as the brew master. That company is now called Sapporo Holdings, Ltd.

Both Kirin and Asahi breweries were also established in that same period some years after Sapporo Holdings.