WILLER EXPRESS held a “2026 Strategy Briefing” in Tokyo on December 4. The presentation was given by Koji Hirayama, President and Representative Director.
In 2025, the company’s express bus business has recorded an increase in revenue and profit compared to 2024. Although the number of seats sold is down 22% from 2019 before Corona and 6% from 2024, the occupancy rate has increased to about 90% in 2025, 87.5% compared to 79.2% in 2019 and 85.8% in 2024, and can exceed 90% in the busy months of March and August.
WILLER EXPRESS express buses generally have 40 seats, and currently “we imagine that there are only about 4 seats available per flight”. The national average unit price is 4848 yen in 2019, 5328 yen in 2024, and 5594 yen in 2025. Although the number of seats supplied is 20% less than before Corona, the company has been able to achieve increases in revenue and profit as a result of higher demand and unit prices (all figures are estimates).
Mr. Hirayama cited the continued acceleration of the shift to night buses (traveling while sleeping rather than staying the night before) due to the rising cost of lodging as the background to this trend, and furthermore, a change in customer composition is also occurring.
Although the share of inbound travel is small, the number of inbound travelers has increased by 20%, and use has expanded not only among students but also among those with high disposable incomes who had previously shunned night buses. The success of the branding of value-added features such as “3-row seats” with ample seating space and “canopies” that allow passengers to hide their sleeping faces has also been a factor in gaining the support of passengers, according to the analysis.
In terms of branding, the company’s new designation of bus drivers as “highway pilots (HWP)” starting in April 2024 is having a positive effect, and the number of applications from newly graduated college students is actually increasing.
The shortage of drivers continues to be an issue, and we will further strengthen recruitment and education based on the WILLER LABO, an educational institution for inexperienced drivers, and begin local recruitment activities for foreign HWP in February 2025 (Vietnam, Philippines, Nepal, Bangladesh, and India) and for high school graduate HWP in July, In addition, the company is also working to strengthen recruitment of university graduate HWPs, which was not part of the plan.
On the other hand, the company faces the following problems: accepting a diverse workforce, including inexperienced workers and foreigners, increases the difficulty of quality control; the company’s perspective of a (hard x soft) mobile service with an awareness of customer service and hospitality makes it rather difficult to retain experienced workers; and specified technical interns for bus and cab crew members are required to pass the JLPT (Japanese Language Proficiency Test) N Despite the fact that specific technical intern trainees for bus and taxi drivers are required to pass the JLPT (Japanese Language Proficiency Test) at the N3 level, they also face the problem that the test is held only once every six months.
One of the most interesting topics in Mr. Hirayama’s talk was the hiring of high school graduates. He said that in rural areas, the ties between schools and local businesses are strong, and it is difficult for new companies to gain the trust of schools and teachers, and in many cases, even if students want to work, the schools do not approve them.
The company plans to strengthen “direct marketing to students” by steadily disseminating information on social networking services, etc. In addition, as the career path of acquiring a large class 2 diploma to ensure acquisition of skills and annual income of 6 million yen (example of second year employment) becomes known, the number of university graduate applicants is increasing. This has also had the side effect of increasing the number of university graduates applying for jobs. However, the company has already stopped accepting applications for 2026 graduates because there are not enough vacancies at the training center at present. The company’s LABO is also focusing on training flight instructors, but Mr. Hirayama said, “We don’t have enough people to teach. It is an urgent issue”.
© Source travel watch