Department store operator Marui Group has announced the launch of a credit card that allows users to make donations to museums and art galleries according to the amount of card usage.
The company introduced the Museum Epos Card on Friday in partnership with the National Museum of Art, the National Institutes for Cultural Heritage and the National Museum of Nature and Science, all of which are independent administrative institutions in Japan.
Card users receive 0.5% of the amount spent as reward points — of the reward points accumulated, the equivalent of 0.1% of the amount spent is donated to the institutions. Donations will be used for museum operations and other expenses.
There are 12 card designs that use cultural properties from each museum's collection, such as "Grand Bouquet of Flowers" by Paul Cezanne. Each design represents the institution to which donations are made through the card.
The card company will donate ¥1,000 per enrollment. There are no enrollment or annual fees.
"To pass our cultural assets on to the future, we need support from everyone," Isao Mizuta, director of the National Institute for Cultural Heritage, told a news conference Friday.
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