Interview with Haru Matcha, Nicha and Francis

Ryan · 0:00

Hello and welcome to the Specialty Matcha Podcast. My name is Ryan. This is Zongjun Li, who also goes by Sam. Hello, hello. And we're the cofounders of Sanko Matcha Products. Yeah, we launched this podcast to discuss our learning journey, Matcha, share startup stories and interview experts.

Ryan · 0:14

And today we have Nicha and Francis from Hado Matcha joining us. Welcome guys. Hi, Hi. So nice to be on the podcast. Yeah, we're. So excited to be here. Great to have you on. We'd love to learn a little bit about more about you guys, like where you're based, what your your background is and your matcha journey.

Francis · 0:33

Yes, I'll, I guess I'll start. So we're especially, especially Matcha brand based out of London in the UK. We started really because we wanted to showcase the different cultivars of matcha and different tasting notes that you can get with matcha. So we noticed that Matcha is starting to become a little bit popular, people starting to drink it a few years ago, but it's still like a very like generic product. Whereas actually we, we know that it can be like a lot more kind of complex showing different cultivars and different varieties from different parts of Japan. And so we really want to bring

Francis · 1:11

that to, to the UK and kind of like show the UK market how, how great matcha can be, how complex it can be, how nuanced it can be as well. So, so, so we launched recently in December and that was like our our first, first matcha pouch matcha product and which was like a Hana blend.

Francis · 1:30

And but before that, we were doing lots of matcha tasting experiences, which we'll be doing in the in the year before that, which really inspired by, by Nicha's kind of knowledge of matcha who like really kick started it and had done matcha tasting experiences a lot in in Thailand as well.

Nicha · 1:45

Yeah, so I grow up and I'm from Thailand. I work and study in Bangkok. You might have known Ryan because you've been there. And that's there's a lot of matcha, specialty matcha bar, I would say. And so that I'm get familiar with the high quality of matcha and I'm really fascinated by food culture in general.

Nicha · 2:06

And then to get to see like there's so much nuances and a lot of knowledge behind matcha. I think it's so fascinating. And I also like go to Japan quite a few times since I was a kid because my mom, she studied there. So I'm familiar with kind of Japanese cultures.

Nicha · 2:23

And I really like, like the philosophy behind almost everything, especially matcha. I went to the tea ceremony and to learn how to like make, make matcha in the tea ceremony. And I think it's such a beautiful kind of angles of matcha that we not we don't really see a lot in the Western world. And when I moved to the UK, when I come to my my masters in 2021, I was just quite disappointed that I cannot find actually a great difference.

Nicha · 2:55

Like I wasn't that many cafe that do good matcha. They probably use like a really bad quality one. I literally cannot drink that. Yeah. And I was like, I'm sure you guys probably know on the Arabica coffee the day of matcha, and that's the first time that I introduced Matcha to Francis was actually our first date. Wow.

Nicha · 3:22

Beautiful. And he was saying like, oh, it tastes just like seaweed. And I just say like, Oh, yeah, I mean, this is quite good quality already, but like, I mean, not as good as the one that I've tried in back home in Japan.

Nicha · 3:35

So I'll just like, OK, like I need to bring you like the good quality matcha. And so when I, he sits at home and then I bring some matcha powder back to the UK, he was like, Oh my God, this is like, this is really, really nice.

Nicha · 3:49

Quite naughty. If I remember correctly, that was the one from Yame. Yeah. It just really changed his perspective on the matcha. And I think that's how we sort of OK, Let's there's still a lot of gaps in the UK. And we also don't see a lot of matcha appreciations. A lot of matcha here.

Nicha · 4:08

Not that it's a bad quality, but it's full of syrup or a lot of milk in it. And when I had it, I cannot really test any matcha tests in it. It's just milk or syrup. And it's quite like disturbing. Yeah. I'm sorry to be cynical here.

Ryan · 4:27

Totally agree. Like it's it's not not comparable much. It seems like Bangkok is like several generations in front of maybe even like the rest of the world and definitely a step forward than Japan even. And the way it presents it to a consumer because in Japan it's all like. In the very contemporary consumption scenario. Yeah.

Ryan · 4:48

Yeah, yeah, yeah. We've been blown away by everything that we've seen and tasted in Bangkok and learned. It's easier to learn. Actually, I think there's no better place to learn as a consumer about matcha than like going to like an MTCH and just chatting with the person behind the bar. Like everyone's so knowledgeable. It's.

Ryan · 5:10

It's. It's better than our experience in Uji and in the Main St. Yeah, cuz the founder of MTCH, he knows a lot and a part of our brand. I feel like I've been inspired a lot by what he is doing as well. Just like man, like the way that we can educate people a little bit more about matcha and so that people can test and understand like or at least differentiate between good and bad matcha. I think it's really interesting and yeah. Yeah.

Zongjun · 5:45

I think it just really gives you like that perspective on what the UK is missing out on. Yeah, having like seen it over and like experienced it like growing up in Thailand as well. How do you see like UK and English tea culture clashing with this idea of matcha? Like I imagine that like the old grandma and grandpas don't even wouldn't even think of matcha as tea necessarily. Like it's something so and what they know. Like how do you see those two cultures clashing? Yeah, that's such a good, like, such a good question, I think. Yeah.

Francis · 6:19

I mean, well, tea is like a big thing in the UK, but also people might be quite like, protective over exactly how the tea should be done or they're used to it like a particular way. We have seen like this place in London kind of doing because you know, like afternoon tea is like that big thing for how we like consume tea in the in the UK. So there's people trying to be doing like a matcha afternoon tea where it's like combining like matcha and we did go and we feel like if we did that, we could like maybe do it better. But but we have we have found as well like because we've done we do matcha pop ups in different

Francis · 6:57

places and we've done it like to different like different places in London and in places in the UK have like obviously different markets. So like some people obviously like younger demographics, some older demographics.

Francis · 7:08

And we've seen like people who are more kind of like maybe older, more like entrenched in how T should be a bit are a bit like represent like reluctant to. Kind of. Try match. But but yeah, I mean, I think I think like the more it kind of gets embedded, I think the more people will be accepting of it as a part of tea culture in the UK because that's like where tea culture came from is like bringing tea from unknown tea from like the, you know, E over to here.

Francis · 7:40

And it's kind of like the same thing. But but also I think that match, like the way match is drunk sometimes here, it's almost not presented as if it's like tea because it's like presented in a way if it's coffee or is it or is it or with like lots of syrup, like in a similar way to where they sell Starbucks doesn't really emphasize that the element all the time. Like I've even known some people not even actually who are like very unfamiliar with match and not even know it's it's tea. Yeah.

Nicha · 8:10

Yeah, I've experienced similar things. It's like shocking sometimes. Yeah, Yeah. But I think when when we do the sampling, so because now we are stopping at Japan Center and when we go there to do the sampling to introduce people to the matcha and we start to see older generations, they are more interested, but they focus a lot on the health benefits. They usually come last and ask like I heard that this tea has a lot of antioxidants or like I heard that this tea helps me thinner and those things like they focus quite a lot on the health benefits, which is quite interesting because I think in Thailand it's a little bit

Ryan · 8:46

different. So we focus a lot on the test. And I think I drink a lot of mush and I wasn't really focused too much on what's in it. Like, yeah, I just know, yeah, it's drainage should be. I didn't lie back in the day, I didn't know that it actually has a lot of antioxidants, for example. It's interesting something Sam and I've talked about is that like an Asian coffee and tea culture that's not traditional like this more modern concepts like these bubble teas, all the coffee programs and and matcha. It's like it's a indulgent thing. It's like it's like a it's I don't want to call it a dessert alternative, but the consumer

Ryan · 9:27

needs state like is very different like mindset the. Way you think about. They call it the dessertification of the beverage, so. All of these. Beverages are turning into a small dessert. Almost. Yeah, yeah, I can imagine that because like every after meal, I feel like I need something sweet.

Nicha · 9:46

I would just probably go for matcha because it seems to be a little bit better than getting Thai tea because it's green. Yeah. And also I just add a little bit on the UK culture thing on the health benefits. We see a lot of product development that they mix much up with like Lion Mane's or kind of like other substance to help you focus or like increase productivity because like I think a lot of trend here focus on health conscious, on health aware. Yeah, we saw a lot of that coming. Like these mushroom matchas?

Zongjun · 10:24

And yeah. I wonder from a flavor perspective, like do you see a pattern of, you know, preference towards different flavor of matcha in the UK versus like other places in like for example, Bangkok or of your own preference? Like do you see there's a difference or more like similarities?

Zongjun · 10:42

Because I would imagine like, you know, people in the UK drink like English breakfast or you know, or great, like these are more oxidized kind of flavor profile, which you don't necessarily find them in matcha most of the time.

Nicha · 10:54

Maybe in Hojicha a little bit. Yeah. So what do people usually like in in the UK? Yeah, I think it's quite mixed. So we have Matcha from Uji, which is more like umami and quite refreshing and related kind of floral or seaweed tones. And then we have the other one from Yame, which is more like nati tones.

Nicha · 11:14

And we see that there's some mix between like people, when we do sampling, see if we make it like without milk, we see that people actually quite like the Uji one quite a lot. OK. Mixed with meal, they do really like the the Yame one because they do feel like it can relate to like kind of roasty, which is quite similar to coffee.

Nicha · 11:36

And I think for people who love coffee, they really like the Yame flavour profile more. And yeah, I remember you say like so first time the Francis test, the Yame 1. He really likes it. And he also really like Hojicha, you say? It's really similar to goodness.

Francis · 11:53

Yeah, I can totally see that. Yeah, exactly. Yeah. I mean, I would say like, I mean speaking to me like my like my parents and stuff like showing them mature and they just like always have tea in there. Like there's other people who just they have to have tea every day. Like if they go on holiday, they have to bring English breakfast tea to have like every day.

Francis · 12:12

Like we can't not have. So I guess like when they try it's a bit, I think she, my mom said like, oh, it takes a bit of getting used to. Like she's like quite a different flavour like that you're not used to with the kind of freshness. The matcha tea, I think, yeah, it's, I think it's something which for a lot of people that are used to like English breakfast tea, that takes a bit of getting used to when you drink it, like as a suture.

Nicha · 12:40

Yeah, I would say, yeah, yeah. I think it's when we introduce usucha, it's more difficult to get people into it, I would say, because they are not used to it. And sometimes they say that it's like too bitter for them because it's usucha is without milk or any syrup.

Nicha · 12:56

And when we sell in the pop up market, we also don't add any syrup. If we do latte, we just add quite a lot of matcha shots on and without syrup. So some people would ask for syrup, but we're trying to introduce like no syrup and just focus on matcha.

Nicha · 13:12

It's been quite an interesting journey. Well, because people are ladder too. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Some people find it quite similar to green tea, but we're trying to to explain like what's the difference between the matcha and green tea?

Francis · 13:25

Yeah. How, how does the flavour profile go down like the US? Because we don't really know much of, well, I don't really know much about the perception of it there. Yeah, I think it depends on where you are. Yeah. Like the coasts usually, like get everything first, like New York, LA, San Francisco. I lived in New York for 6-7 years, so I have the most consumer experience there.

Francis · 13:49

And, you know, the concept of origin in New York is very, very new. I, I moved out in 2022. And even then there was one place that kind of generally had a lot of Yame. There's some place, the few places that had Uji. And then like everywhere else, like didn't specify like matcha was matcha.

Francis · 14:08

Maybe like if you talk to a barista, they'd be like, yeah, we have ceremonial grade. It's a, it was a very different conversation. I think that's changing. I've only observed it remotely, but of the much of founders that I've talked to that are US based, the general consensus is that there's a leaning towards a lot of the Yame flavor profiles when presented the option and they've compared the two.

Francis · 14:33

But that said, too, you have all the explosion of these traditional Uji vendors that have a very Uji flavor profile that, you know, people are also really enjoying too. So it's a big mix. Yeah, yeah, creators and I think a lot of people here, they focus a lot on Uji because they know that Uji is the birth place or like the way social media is presented, Matcha is that Uji is probably the best place to get matcha. So that's why they always like, oh, is this from Uji? They focus on the origin.

Zongjun · 15:09

Yeah, when people start to. Know. Yeah, when? Yeah, when they know. Yeah, there's still a lot of people who just don't know a lot, a lot about it. Yeah, well, even within the Uji once, like once you've known it that it gets really complex because I think we're going to record a podcast episode.

Zongjun · 15:23

We don't know what we're going to title it yet. We need to find the right narrative to frame this because, you know, it's quite sensitive. Yeah, because, like, what is it Like less than 1% of Uji matcha's grown in Uji. It's pretty deceptive. It's just unfair.

Zongjun · 15:40

Like they're like within the Japanese government. Like I have a definition of like a variance, like where your tencha comes from. And it can come from neighboring prefectures or from up, you know, in Wazuka and within Kyoto Prefecture. But like, you know, most of it's coming from Kagoshima and processed in Uji.

Ryan · 15:58

And I'm beginning to think that it's like a lot more like Swiss chocolate, right? There's no chocolate or cocoa production being done in Switzerland, but that's where a lot of value is being added to create profiles that people think of as as chocolate. But also, on the other hand, it's really not, you know, something that it's inevitable by the end of the day because there's just not enough tea being ground in Uji. And in order for all these matcha brands and matcha manufacturers and the whole matcha community to survive, they kind of have to import tea from elsewhere and get it to processing too much.

Ryan · 16:32

So it's quite complicated as we learn more about it. There's no black and white in this whole situation. Yeah, it you can really argue both sides on the consumer perspective. The more I think about it, if you call a tea a Yame tea, like it comes from Yame, if you call a tea from Kagoshima or Shizuoka, or even like more specific like Chiran within Kagoshima, it is a statement of origin. And you have all of these statements of origin, and they're all true except one, which is really bizarre. Yeah, yeah.

Nicha · 17:03

We can really relate because when we went to Uji, I was actually surprised it was, it was our first time in Uji. And then we would expect like, you know, when we go to France, you see a lot of vineyard in Bordeaux. Yeah. Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah.

Nicha · 17:17

And then when we were in Uji, it's like, oh. It's. Small. It's very small and every brand in the UK say that the tea is from Uji. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Yeah, it's very surprising. And we also visited a couple of farm that it's a little bit like outside of the Uji centre, but like Ujitawara, for example, or Goku show, yeah, which is like also like. Oh Goku show.

Nicha · 17:40

Yeah, that's a bit bigger than in the central Uji, but yeah, still not that much. And when we drive on the road, we just thought, like, where? Where are the tea farms? It's just like snow. It's like it's we'd we'd visited like vineyards in France. Yeah.

Nicha · 17:59

And yeah, it was like very like wide expanse of just everywhere. Yeah, we were doing the same thing in Uji on one day too. And it's actually quite sad because like if we look around like all of these landscape, all these like buildings and highways, they're used to all be like tea farms, tea gardens and Urban Development just slowly eating into the tea production and the farmer has very little control over it.

Nicha · 18:24

Like there's one honzu shaded garden that we have visited, you know, 1 ginormous like highway bridge just cut straight through it. It's it's very sad to see that. Yeah, yeah. That's really sad because it's already low supply as well. Yeah, already low and there's like abandoned tea fields all over.

Nicha · 18:46

You don't have to walk very far to find like clearly abandoned tea fields within Uji proper. It's it's, it's really weird, like some of the best terroir arguably in the world. It's just sitting vacant. It hurts the soul.

Francis · 19:01

Yeah, Yeah, honestly. And also like with the aging society, like it's quite concerning in terms of like interesting generational, like kind of knowledge, like who will take care of the farm in the next 40-50 years. Yeah, just like really like nice too, because we like met some of some of the farmers and when it's like a really into generational thing, like one of the more farmers we spoke to, I think he had like his grandfather was like still picking tea leaves and he's like how old he was, like late 80s.

Francis · 19:32

Yeah, yeah, yeah. And that's something that they well, in this particular. So it's like very like long tradition and their family is like very cherished as part of that kind of family tradition. Yeah. It's just. I want to see.

Ryan · 19:46

Keep going. Yeah. Yeah. Absolutely. So how did you guys find like your trip in your sourcing trip and like how it met your expectations and what you learned on the ground and talking to farmers? Yeah, it was so fascinating. And all of that just basically show us that it just requires a lot of work, a lot of dedications, a lot of care, knowledge and expertise.

Francis · 20:09

More than. We actually thought it would be. It's like when you once you see it with your own eyes, it's just like wow. This all add up to why matcha is like more expensive than a green tea. And I still feel that much like the that they sell is still not that expensive considering like when you when you get from the brand, a lot of the brand here, they add quite a lot of profit margin on that. And that's like surprise that oh wow, like the farmers didn't sell it at that higher price comparing to what the middleman get.

Francis · 20:40

And it's really interesting. So when the farms we visited in Goku show is the farm of the husband and the wife and wife, she walked us through like and guide us through the farms. So luckily we were there before the busy times.

Francis · 20:56

So we were there around like late February, early March and they were not covering the shade just yet because they will usually cover at the end of March. And that also means that and interact a lot with them because they, so they, they have like Sai Midori, Utah Hikari, Sai Midori Asahi and Honsu Asahi in the farms.

Francis · 21:20

And so like we are like, so what's the difference between all of them? Like from like Uchi Curry has like curly leaf or like cyber has to like more straight kind of like stem so that it's easier to, to pick, for example.

Francis · 21:35

And I think like the really tricky thing is that they can only like, so the first harvest like once in a year is only three weeks. So that's really, really crunch time for them to finish everything in three weeks. So we were like saying, wow, that's really short period of time. Like how do you manage that?

Francis · 21:53

So they would have to hire like the more tea pickers and they will start working from AM until the end of the day, which is really overworking. I would say. Like I feel like they deserve a lot of more compensation for that. And like all of this really add up. Like they hand pick and everything is done by hand. And also like like different cultivars have different like kind of picking period, which I think is really interesting kind of anecdote.

Francis · 22:24

For example, like Asahi, you can only do it like within maybe one to two days and or to hit Curry as well. That's why it's really expensive. But with Sammy Dory, they say it's around like 10 days. And for us, like we would say to her that it's very short and then she's like, first, this is already very long.

Francis · 22:46

It's like, wow, it's a really stressful time. Like when you buy the Masha powder, like you wouldn't really know all about this until really go there. Yeah, yeah. It's amazing to see like the care and the precision. Like we asked like, how do you decide what day and what time to pick?

Francis · 23:04

And she's like. And she said, Oh, my husband decides this, This is very, very serious decision. Yeah. Just like the care and like, yeah, attention they paid to it. It's just, yeah, it's quite amazing to see. Yeah, and varies day by day, like you cannot really like pick the day, but it depends on like the weather as well. And especially like this year, I think the weather is changing quite a lot.

Francis · 23:29

It varies quite a lot. So the harvest times really like moved a little bit. Yeah, we just work so hard. And she also have like the the plantation with just the organic, but it also costs a lot to get the certified fertilizer for that and the umami flavours also like affected by like the fertilizer. I think that's.

Francis · 23:54

Yeah, because another farm when we visited, we were asking like how the the flavour profile isn't like how the flavour profile is affected by different things like the tawar and the Cheney. And he said like a lot of it's affected by the fertilizer. Yeah.

Francis · 24:09

Yeah, yeah, because we thought it just like a lot on like the Toroa and like the cultivars and but Ashley a lot of. Yeah, which does have an impact, but like, yeah, he was saying that fertilizer has like a big impact on them.

Francis · 24:23

Yeah, fertilizer is almost like part of the processing of the tea. I feel like a lot of the flavor is driven by the different recipes of different gardens, different farmers that they end up creating, which is quite fascinating. Like different farmers, they will use different proportion of, you know, the fish or the rice or they sometimes add like, you know, oyster shells or not sesame extracts and different things together to blend into the the fertilizer. So that's, you know, their own recipes, recipes and it's kind of their own trade secrets.

Francis · 24:55

That's one thing that they do not talked about actually doing all of these, you know, community gathering because like they they all kind of shared the same tension oven Corp, you know, in different regions. And they would like all talk to each other and, you know, kind of share the processing optimization that they each end up doing and, you know, kind of teach or, you know, just learn from each other.

Francis · 25:17

But one thing that they do not share is their fertilizer recipe. Yeah. We didn't get the fertilizer recipe information. Like trade secret yeah and also the shape days is also varies from farm to farms. I think that's also play a role in the in the flavour as well. The soil in Uji is quite like a sandy soil. I'm not sure about Yami because I haven't been there just yet, but yeah, it's interesting to see how all of these like all add up into the matcha powder and just so fascinating. And then in the other farm that we went in Ujiwara, I would say because he's in the quite a young generation, he's around our age.

Francis · 26:02

And so his perspective on much that seems to be a little bit different from the one in Coco show, for example, like in Google show, they still do a lot of traditional method like Honsu Asahi where they use a rice draw to to cover the matcha, but here and so that do the handpick there.

Francis · 26:20

But then in Ujiwara 1, he was like, it doesn't matter if you use handpick or you use the machine pick. For him, it's not just about the traditional, which is quite interesting take. And also for player a lot of role, I think it's really interesting that kind of different perspective. Yeah.

Francis · 26:40

It's it because it doesn't, not everyone shares the same kind of opinions. It's like pretty interesting talking to different like levels of industrialization within this industry and scale because and then you realize you really can't like it's perspective. It's not truth and there is no truth. And like everyone has their own opinion. And then like, it turns into a very complex story actually. Yeah, yeah, exactly.

Francis · 27:03

I would say like using machine pick in his farm. That's some really to me, Masha is still so, so good. Like it doesn't really matters. I know that in the Western world we use a lot of like, oh, this is hand picked, you know, but for it doesn't. And like the first indicator to say that, oh, this Masha is bad or low quality because at the end of the day, it's still like everything combined.

Francis · 27:27

And yeah. Yeah, I think some of the concepts that they use to like evaluate food and drink products in the West don't necessarily apply in the same way in Japan. Like a lot of people want to see it being organic, but the this is the sort of barrier to being organic in Japan is like places have like organic, are organic. And yeah, it being organic doesn't necessarily mean it's like, it not being organic doesn't necessarily mean it's worse, especially given the role that fertilizer can play in the flavor profile as well.

Francis · 28:03

We were gifted some 2 reference samples that were processed by the same farm in the same tencha processing factory, harvested at the same time, both Okumidori on standard like fertilize and you know normal like healthy use of pesticides like conventional agriculture and zero pesticide, zero fertilizer.

Francis · 28:26

The difference between those teas was insane. The bitterness level, the astringency, the complexity, the nuance, the body, the umami, they were two completely different things. Like the fertilizer is so important. We were blown away.

Ryan · 28:42

Yeah. We really changed our mental model of what's driving flavour in matcha cultivation. Which one is Umami? Oh the the convention. Surprise, surprise. Turns out that all of these agricultural agricultural innovations have improved the taste over time. There's some like really weird Internet commentary I've been reading on Reddit recently of some people that are really into old school farming and they're like, oh, we should go back to the way the samurai used to drink it. Like ditch all of this modern stuff. We should just do the natural thing. And I'm in full support of this type of agriculture in general. I think that people should, you

Ryan · 29:22

know, limit the use of pesticides and, and it's like some things, but like the reality is it's really, really, really hard to get it to taste good. And actually outside of Doka Shell, there are very few producers that can make a good tasting organic product that is even comparable to the sensory experience of some of the others, at least in our experience.

Nicha · 29:43

Yeah, yeah. We also got the sample from from Wazuka and so he's like the tea farmer that also grow rice and also matcha in his farm. This was really interesting. And in Wazuka, yeah, in Wazuka and OK pesticide, yeah, I can say that like the matcha taste like quite different from from Uji, Yeah. But I think it also depends on like different like palette, you know, like some people might prefer umami and things. So there's no right over.

Nicha · 30:21

Yeah, yeah. And how would you prepare it as well? Yeah, yeah, yeah, I like. To. And the processing obviously also makes a big difference. Yeah, exactly. The one that we went to Ujitawara, we really feel so warm welcome because he invited us into his all tea house that is has been there for like 100 years and he was doing like the matcha tasting for us, which we really, really appreciate.

Nicha · 30:45

It feels so like, so intimate. Yeah, that was really cool. That was the highlight of our trip because we were like in his house and has like very traditional house drink, like matcha that yeah, the farm's really cool. Yeah, like the tea House of the farmer and his house is just like so close to where they firstly invented the matcha grinding process. So he said that this area is actually the true origin of matcha.

Nicha · 31:14

Yeah, which is really nice. And we also went to visit like a couple of matcha, like the mall, like famous brand that a lot of more global, like Horii Shichimeien. And yeah, so we went there and obviously we asked a lot of questions because we just so like like a nerd in mature. We want to sort of like learn almost everything, and we asked like they're like he's shop assistant. And then Horii-san probably see that we really, really into this that he was just basically come to help explain and he also like make like doing a matcha tasting for us and we was like, Oh my God.

Nicha · 31:53

Like. That's special. Oh my God, this is like a celebrity. Yeah, like that's, I think that's also another memory that I really like from the trip. Yeah. Because actually in the Uji Museum, I have a bit of information about him. Yeah, Yeah.

Ryan · 32:10

And we'd just done the tasting with him and then we saw him in the. Yeah. Very lucky you guys had Narino cultivar from them. Yeah, my that like totally changed my perception of matcha the first time I tasted it a couple of years ago.

Nicha · 32:28

It's really. It was magical. Yeah, sometimes, like once you try a really, really good matcha, you just feel like you cannot go back to the average one. That's the. Part. Yeah. And that's going to cost you a lot of money.

Nicha · 32:43

Ask them about like, because in the West, like a lot of people typically drink match with milk and like Lata and stuff. Ask them about like what they think about if, if people are drinking match about drinking match with milk and they were like, you can't drink that milk. You cannot drink that milk.

Nicha · 32:58

You have to drink it. Like if you're going to buy this, you've got to drink. It yeah straight yeah. Because he I can't understand he's point of view though, because like he put a lot of work and he just want people to really test what he produced, which is totally fair.

Nicha · 33:13

Oh yeah totally understandable. We got the experience like tea picking and saw some tea processing over the course of time in different areas. Oh my God, it's back breaking works. It's really hard to make matcha and very difficult. Got to spend a lot of effort and dumping that into like a cup of milk.

Nicha · 33:35

It's criminal. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Because especially when it's like, I don't know, some people will be like hyperbar matcha. And it's like, I think what you like is actually not matcha. It's just like a lot of milk and a lot of syrup together, which I mean, yeah, you.

Ryan · 33:51

Could say the same thing about a lot of the coffee consumption, too. Yeah, yeah, yeah. But then like there, the axis of appreciation is a little different. Like you have the indulgent tastes of the you know, the syrups and the milk, but also like a what could be arguably considered a healthier relationship with caffeine too. Like if it's a nice caffeinated beverage and you're very caffeine sensitive.

Ryan · 34:12

So it's like if if if you perspective shift a little bit. It's interesting watching people cast judgement on the Internet about this matcha and milk debate. It's endlessly because like I really agree with like horizon, like for especially for the Norino and the Okonoyama.

Ryan · 34:28

I admit that I actually have done some experiments tasting what does this taste like with milk, just out of my own curiosity, and did some side by sides. Like it objectively actually still tastes good. So like can it be crafted into an incredibly tasting product?

Ryan · 34:46

Undeniably, the answer is yes. And actually, I think that Thailand is on the bleeding edge of that area of taking the best ingredients, insanely meticulous, perfect, well crafted preparation. There's a guy, I forget his name, but his Instagram handles, minimal meal and he's very good friend. He's in Sukhumvit, but he's very good friends with the Kyoto tea people in Southon.

Ryan · 35:13

But he's doing these insane things with like handpicked Asahi cultivar from Suji San in like Gee Shirakawa and like mixing it with various things. But it's so elevated. Like it feels like it's fine cuisine mixed with this.

Ryan · 35:28

And like, you see, like Suji san reposting his stuff like. So he must be OK with the fact that it's being used as an ingredient and really interesting things going on in the edges of that. Like, I argue both sides all the time. Oh, you're going to ruin the subtlety and nuance. But then on the other side, like, well, if I got to try a competition Asahi cultivar Gelato that someone spent a whole lot of time, energy and effort making taste amazing, yeah, I'd buy it.

Nicha · 35:58

Yeah, yeah, I think it's fair. Like mixed with milk. Then you got to also present the taste of the matcha very well. I think probably like in Thailand when I, I also went to the workshop, matcha workshop in Thailand and like I got this recipe and I think they used like 5 grams of matcha.

Nicha · 36:18

I think that's why it can also still introduce the the taste of matcha really well. I think versus here in the Cafe generally, I think they use probably like 1 to 2 grams. Yeah, they're not using enough. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Nicha · 36:33

We'll, we'll do matcha tasting experiences. Typically we try and like show everyone like the pure matcha from different cultivars and like talk, I talk about the origin about it and like try and get people to think about the tasting notes and, and tell them about the origin.

Nicha · 36:48

And then the then at the end we get the chance to like have like matcha latte. Yeah. And we're kind of like because we know that I guess there's some, there's like different audiences to like cater for as well. And we're sometimes trying to shut, well, trying to show people who may only had it as a matcha latte to appreciate it. They're kind of different cultures first before they have it as a matcha latte.

Ryan · 37:10

So that's kind of a way of, yeah, like boosting on the hearts and dare experience of matcha. Yeah. But we've found that's like an interesting way of doing that. Yeah, yeah. What what when you're doing workshops and stuff or or like markets, what is predictive of someone liking matcha and really probably is then going to become a repeat consumer.

Ryan · 37:32

Like if you're watching people walk by or someone's walking up and you're probably in the back of your mind have some sense, OK, I think this person's going to like it or I think this person isn't going to like it. How do you form that profile of person? Yeah.

Nicha · 37:47

Yeah, I feel like we have gone on snap. I don't want to be like. I don't want to be like. Difficult question, Ryan. They like loads of stereotypes and stuff like that. But yeah, we definitely have got perceptions. I mean, I guess well with with like some older generation, I would say we would come up.

Nicha · 38:05

They do sometimes try it. And I think especially at first when we're doing it like when we're first doing like markets and experiences, it was quite difficult to like sell to them. And we had some like market like pop up markets where we were in an area where it's pretty much just like all older generation people. And it was like very difficult to sell matcha. And we were getting like, what is this like? And it was like a very like foreign flavour to them. But yeah.

Nicha · 38:32

And I guess there is, it's probably like people who I'd say about like around 30. I mean, obviously people who are from kind of like East Asian culture, like from Thailand are more you know, or, or from sort of countries around there are more used to more used to matcha different bride as a matcha.

Nicha · 38:56

And so they know what to expect. I think with we, we sometimes find it hard to like in a pop up like tasting to convert someone who's like hasn't heard it before, convert them straight away when giving them a taste of like Usucha and then convert them on the spot to them buy like most of the people who are buying are people who like have had nothing before and.

Nicha · 39:15

This is a better product. For that and then, yeah. And then they're looking at it like, so especially because of the what we sell as well, because we're selling some, we're selling somewhere, which is like, oh, different cultivars, like different tasting notes and like different types of matcha. So if they come up and they haven't even heard of matcha, it's quite hard to then like sell them like, oh, this is from Yame, this is from media.

Nicha · 39:37

And I don't even know what matcha is. Is it tea? And it's like, yeah, quite hard, so. Yeah, that. Makes a lot of sense. Like they're already consumers and then it's first taste of a like, which probably their first taste of like a good product. Like if they're just used to getting matcha randomly from, you know, yeah, yeah, yeah.

Nicha · 39:56

Like any random place. Yeah, It's really nice to see when people are like, oh, this is so good. And sometimes you try to like, call people who already just got like, the Blank Street coffee matcha. Yeah. And they were like, oh, like, this is really nice. We I think we want to push a little bit more on, like, we want people to choose their own matcha origins and cultivars based on a taste of notes they like. But most of the time don't really care at that moment. I think they just like OK I just want matcha latte. Like that would be like around 80 or 90% of people who buy to just straight away matcha latte.

Nicha · 40:33

So we actually, because we, we put on, we do like the market. We, we put on the menu at different cultivars from different regions. So they just like choose the region rather than just, yeah, rather than like actually just choose matcha latte. We tried to get them like to choose the region or the cultivar.

Nicha · 40:48

So that the choice architecture prompts the right thinking. Yeah, exactly. Yeah, yeah, yeah, we're. Doing a pop up, we need to do this. Yeah. Have you guys paralyzed it? We we we want to eventually have our own space and hopefully it will be like a better experience and prompt people better to to choose like different regions, just like kind of wine, because people like family with the wine concept that you can oh, choose the wine from botto or from prolongs, but much people still not familiar with that. Yeah.

Nicha · 41:24

And that's one, Yeah. One of the things that kind of like areas kind of we try to look to different areas like different products to see like the way they're doing it with maybe in a different product, like different type of drink and to see like how that could be with matcha.

Nicha · 41:36

And obviously wine is something's very embedded as like a such as like fine product and people are very accustomed, especially people who like know wine to it being to picking from different regions and different types of grapes and the blends of different grapes as well. And yeah, and we feel like, yeah, that there could be a lot more of that with matcha, especially in the UK. So we want to try, we want to try and bring that in. But but with even even look to like in the UK that probably doesn't exist in like the US, but like the hot chocolate brand Newts, they have like they the way they show like chocolate. It's like if you go into there

Nicha · 42:14

more of their shops, it's like, and they just sell like, and they'll have on the board like, like you're choosing chocolate from different regions, different places. And they have like the percentage, I think they have the percentage cocoa on the wall.

Nicha · 42:28

And yeah, you can choose it from different countries and that's how you choose the chocolate. And I think that's like a really cool experience as well. So we're trying to look to those different experiences and I think it's something that.

Zongjun · 42:38

There is a chocolate mousse specialty place that looks like an ice cream store format, but it's just chocolate mousse. And it's the same concept in Paris, where it's different percentages and the origins of chocolate. It makes me, it reminded me of that.

Zongjun · 42:54

I think there's so much potential for it. And like I've, I've been to London twice now in the past, like, I don't know, 3-4 months for like to meet with friends and but we had some free time so we checked out the matcha scene and you know, the bar is pretty low.

Zongjun · 43:08

So I think, like, you guys have like, huge white space to fill and it's much needed, I think, within London, yeah. But the pain will be, you know, educating the consumer along the way. We feel like it. But that's also the fun of it, too.

Zongjun · 43:22

Yeah. Yeah, I feel like if you tried to check out the matcha scene 3 years ago, you wouldn't have even been able to do that. There would have been no scene. You guys have great time. Seriously. Like it's. Yeah, it's really exciting.

Zongjun · 43:36

You guys should expand to Paris too. We need it here. I think the only issue is like the matcha supply that sort of kind of limit as we go there just yet. How is the shortage affect you guys so far it's. Really hard to get matcha.

Nicha · 43:52

Yeah, because we're it's hard to like get the right, right quantities. I mean, I guess a lot of it depends on what relationships you have. Like people might have like relationships. Well, we're trying to like source directly from farms and like love them alike. And yeah, we, we can't, we can't deliver that much to you with the amounts we're asking for.

Nicha · 44:13

They yeah, they just, they just can't deliver it like as fast as kind of what we want, even though like we really like them, their matcha. And so, yeah, it's difficult to kind of grow when if you can't get the quantities.

Nicha · 44:27

But I mean. I think for example, like from the Yunomi, they usually will grind the matcha fresh when we place the order, which is a really good thing because then a really fresh matcha and we really like that concept. But the only thing is there's a lot of bottleneck at the grinding facilities because they use they share.

Nicha · 44:49

I think that's like a kind of nationwide problems in Japan that there's a lot of bottlenecks there. So we would have to like place like a really large orders just to make sure that we will get that. And like the lead time now is probably like 2 months or so.

Nicha · 45:04

And because we are still quite new, I would say like we are still like estimating demand lower than it's actually come in. Like we are still not sure like how much we can sell every month. It's really varied so and because we are small, so we cannot also place like way too much, much up because of the cash flow. So it's a lot of kind of operational challenges. I would say like what is the best for us to do and that's why it's a part of that.

Nicha · 45:35

It's also difficult to get matcha because once you have like the cash to place new orders like it's going to come quite late, then you wouldn't have powder to deliver. That was really, really tough. Like we, we could have like, for example, boost more sales like with while like doing more marketing, for example. But now we sort of have to slow, slow down a little bit on our marketing strategy because even though we do it, then we might not have enough matcha to sell.

Nicha · 46:01

So it's probably not worth like snowballing. Yeah, yeah. It's a lot to juggle. Have you tried to maybe source matcha from other regions beyond all these famous or traditional areas? Yeah, we are like trying a lot of matcha arts from other region as well, like Shizuoka and like small Farm that they don't have a lot of order internationally just yet.

Nicha · 46:26

But we still like look for the match that we feel like it's a good quality that meets our standard, which I think that's so explained why it's hard because the group obviously like they might have no order coming in. That's why like the lower quality one, they might not have a lot of order because the quality doesn't meet the standard. It's a really hard problem.

Nicha · 46:47

Yeah. Like we also planning to launch the new one suit from the Ujitawara one because we really like the farm and we really like supporting small farms that produce good quality. Again like because of the small facility. Then there is like the the maximum order that we can order every month.

Nicha · 47:06

Yeah, excellent. Yeah, I think. But one of the things we want to do is show much from different regions. So it's something that we want to do to expand and to showcase from different places. Yeah, yeah. I think that's the cool thing is we both work full time. Wow.

Nicha · 47:22

A lot even more to juggle, yeah. Yeah, like is in behavioral science. So we're both like working in a consulting industry and yeah, we juggling between 2:00. Yeah, we actually met studying behavioral science. Yeah, Yeah. Wow.

Ryan · 47:38

OK. Behavioral science. So like do you guys like work on like consumer behavioral science or is it like other application? Yeah, yeah. Consumer, yeah. Yeah, like, wow, you guys have the perfect background for this. Very cool.

Nicha · 47:50

Yeah. So we like, yeah, I mean, we're trying to like apply that kind of thinking into how we market as well. Yeah, Have you actually test any theories or set up any experiment yet, but. Not the experiment, but I would say because we have the rare matcha, which is actually like the Uji Hikari one, it has come as a very like lower quantity. So we use like this is the rare matcha and it's more expensive. So we have to to add a bit extra. Like if you want extra, you need to pay a little bit more. And when we say rare is works really well because of that scarcity effect that people say, oh, this is like a limited edition thing, like scarce

Nicha · 48:30

thing. So that works really well, Yeah. It's not intentional though. It's like, it's really rare. It's not like. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. But it's just, yeah, no. What kind of things to highlight which are going to like resonate with people?

Ryan · 48:47

Obviously always sticking to like what is authentic and what is actually true? Yeah. So you guys like your day-to-day, are you guys like working with like CPG companies, FMCG and like their marketing teams and like understanding consumer behavior?

Nicha · 49:00

Is that like? In our full time job. Your full time job. Have worked a bit, yeah. Have done CG companies a little bit and understanding kind of, yeah, their behavior and how they would choose and what kind of things would affect the choices they make.

Nicha · 49:11

Like how communication is framed to them, how marketing framed things that can change the perception of the types of words that are used. Or you know, the way the way things are framed to them. Yeah, awesome. Wow, that's cool. Yeah.

Ryan · 49:25

Fascinating. Really good frameworks that you have learned from from that background that you're like thinking about applying to kind of spread the idea of matcha as a specialty product. Kind of like how you were talking about like with wine, how like there's all of these varieties and cultivars and like using these knowledge structures like promoting them in matcha so that like people don't think of it as a commodity. Like what?

Nicha · 49:48

What like framework could you take from behavioral science or have you taken to try to like shift the mindset that it's like a specialty food or a fine food? Yeah. So there's this concept on like reciprocity almost like if you show like all the work behind the scene, then that would really helps people to see and like increase the value perception that they have on the product.

Nicha · 50:10

And for example, you might see the shop some of the chocolate brand they probably have like the chef making chocolate and that also can. Like the lint chef? Yeah, yeah, yeah. We recommend like the clients to do that. So I think like we're trying to sell the story like behind the scene in the workshops or in our on our Instagram food To tell people that much has actually requires a lot of work behind the scene, which is true.

Ryan · 50:36

But like people like can hear a little bit more and make it more like distinct. Yeah. And this is the way it's like the way it's communicated. It can be communicated in so many different ways and there's so many different like frames of communication that can be given to people to understand this product.

Nicha · 50:52

It's not people aren't just like consuming the product itself can kind of consuming the story around it. And there's so many different stories that have been told. Yeah, and like the use of colour, there's like a lot of psychology. I mean, I'm not like neuro design, but there's a little bit like a concept around that of the visual hierarchy and we try to integrate that into our packaging. There's still like there's, I think there's still a lot of room for improvement on the website and the packaging. But yeah, he's trying to embed that ad and kind of introduce a sensory experience in the packaging because I think that makes a much a difference from

Nicha · 51:30

like different region and cultivar. But it's as much because when you look through the shelf or on websites on Amazon like, like what's the difference because. It's all visual. Yeah, so we have like the the Uji One is more floral. So we have the image of like cherry blossoms because it's not, it's not like rose that has very strong like florals and cherry blossom also plays really well with like Japanese like. The teeth, kind of.

Nicha · 52:03

Yeah. And for the Yame One is smoky or like both things. So we have kind of like the like the smoke around the tea leaves. And also the terroir in Yame is more like misty. Like the terroir this particular cultivars grown is kind of misty on the hill.

Ryan · 52:19

So it's kind of like a little bit nuanced and abstracts so people can interpret. Bring in all the senses. Yeah, bring the sense. Yeah, interesting. It might be interesting if you can like set up some kind of AB tests to test different, you know, visual language, visual communication. When like a person clicks into the website, it just randomly leads the person into a, you know, different version of that presentation.

Ryan · 52:44

You can calculate the click rate or the the amount of time they spend on the webpage. I actually love looking at like the, the, the stats, the analytics for, for the website, like when you change something and just like the conversion rate and stuff like that. It's like really interesting.

Zongjun · 53:03

I think it's a lot more interesting when it's your product. How would you guys think about like there's like the consumer piece of this where consumers deciding I want to be a regular specialty matcha consumer. This is something I'm interested in both intellectually learning the regions and the process, etcetera, and in the taste, like the actual hedonic pleasure of consuming this thing and its flavors. But there's also the B to B side where the biggest change matrix makers with the largest leverage are the cafes where all the on premise preparation is happening and exposing A new generation and new set of consumers to this

Zongjun · 53:42

product. How do we market to the business people and the coffee people and the people who have this really enormous leverage, who are choosing to put it on the menu and deciding what that story should be? Yeah. Well, that's a good question.

Nicha · 53:58

Yes, you've got The thing is, is that like we've got so many ideas about how cafes could be like giving this customers like in relative format. Part of us is like, should we, should we be saving these ideas for and create our own space or should we like so? But we have kind of like so when we sell to, because we do sell to like some some cafes and stuff. We kind of tried to say these are some cool things you could do with like how you put it on the menu and stuff. You can sell it through the different regions or the way you prepare it.

Nicha · 54:30

You can prepare it in this cool way that's different to what other people do. So we try to like bring in that consulting element to it as well. We're not just giving you a product, but we also like, we, we, there's like a partnership here that you can work with and we can like advise you on how to do it.

Nicha · 54:45

Yeah. That's awesome. Yeah. We also offer like complementary training for them so that they know how to properly like make the matcha and how do they present products to customers. Like if the customers ask the information, then they can say that correctly. So we offer all that because there's still like a lot of kind of brewing techniques that they might make a shortcut to be honest, because like in the cafe scene is really busy and they probably don't have time to whisk it properly in every bowl. And that's really big challenge and we would always do not pre-make.

Nicha · 55:24

Yeah, yeah, yeah. But I think as well, because you talk about the opportunity in B2B, I think that there's other spaces of work as well which we'd love to like work with, which is used to match like places like hotels where you could create like an experience. Yeah.

Ryan · 55:39

You mentioned earlier about like afternoon tea and stuff in the UK, like, so to be like hotels would have like an afternoon tea experience that would be like the place to go for that. But if you could incorporate more natural experience into that, that could be a way of, yeah, maybe bringing that into kind of the modern day a bit more and be really cool to work with hotels on that. Yeah.

Ryan · 56:00

And the the other places which we think would be cool to kind of bring more matcha to would be like in offices or workplaces, because obviously everyone has like coffee machines and stuff. And what they were preparing matcha to, to start the day to like, you know, to power them for the for the day ahead, then that could be cool, yeah.

Nicha · 56:22

Yeah, yeah. Got a frame of focusing on productivity throughout the day? I think the biggest opportunity is that. But the challenge too is like, imagine like what that like little Matcha station looks like. If not everyone knows how to use the equipment or to keep the dry side dried, the wet side wet to hydrate the chasen and to clean it afterwards.

Ryan · 56:45

Yeah, that's just simply, I don't know how you do it. I think it'd be cool. A bit tricky, yeah. We need to. Someone needs to invent like the equivalent of an espresso machine where the preparation complexity is abstracted away and like it's a push button kind of experience someday. Yeah, that's what that's what I was thinking as well. But I mean I own that have the knowledge to know how to do that.

Zongjun · 57:08

But I think there is an opportunity there. I think we saw a. Tricky hardware problem. We've given it a lot of power and thought they're like this is really tricky. Yeah. I saw like this matcha in the tube product. Not sure you guys have seen. Yeah, yeah.

Nicha · 57:25

Yeah, it's not controversy. Controversial and actually after that happened, I mean it's a really great idea for convenience like just like what you say like you could work in the office. But from that incident, I just realized, wow, like, the way that people, like, who love matcha so much, like, they are very protective of the culture, which is really, really nice as well in a way.

Nicha · 57:48

But it just makes like, as we're like, oh, my God. Like, we need to be very careful when we communicate everything. Yeah. Yeah, it was a great case study for the rest of the industry. Yeah, like, it's not a bad idea. Just had literally the world's worst messenger.

Nicha · 58:04

Yeah, yeah, yeah. I. Think it wasn't it like, because at the start of the video and then just like swiped all the traditional Japanese stuff, like, like really? Yeah, yeah. So she'll include this in the vodka. Even from a product perspective, like we, we haven't tried that one, but we have tried some other ones in Uji actually, and they didn't taste good. It's just a bad product.

Nicha · 58:29

Yeah, it's a long way to go. Well. I cannot imagine it would be great. Yeah. Yeah. And the color and I don't know the test, Yeah. Like the one we tried, the color was actually very suspiciously green. Very green. Ingredients matcha and water it's kind of like slightly thicker than a koicha but. There's definitely something other than water in that tube. Some really interesting citrus note. I don't know what that is.

Nicha · 59:00

Yeah, I think they need to add like preservatives. Yeah, I think so. I don't know how either. It was very almost off putting, but you know, it was priced low. I think it was under ten U.S. dollars for like 8 like pretty large tubes so like the expectation to the taste kind of made sense. Granted it didn't taste good.

Nicha · 59:23

Might be nice for a cookie or something. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Sometimes we get people who want to buy a matcha and I sort of say, oh, this would be great for great. We could use this matcha for like making like cookies or making like our desserts and stuff. And we sort of say like, so don't know how to like respond to that always because we're like, like this is like meant to be for like drinking.

Nicha · 59:46

I mean, you can use it, but you might be basically you'd be overpaying for using a product that you don't need to put into, into baking goods as well. That's why I would try to like add a kind of advice consulting element onto like what we sell.

Nicha · 1:00:00

But then also I want to be like, oh, we're telling you what to do with our product. Like if you buy it, then what to do with that? Yeah. I mean, there are matcha that just meant for, you know, being put into a bakery or well, it's it's even in Hari Shi to man like they have like matcha designed for latte on their menu.

Nicha · 1:00:20

There are matcha are meant to be served for certain purposes. And yeah, but this whole matcha shortage thing, it's really a shortage of good matcha. There's no shortage of, you know, other matcha. Yeah, that's true. At Japan Centre there they sometimes have like Marukyu matcha and there was the day that they restocked that and we were doing the sampling there as well.

Nicha · 1:00:42

And obviously they like a lot of people come to find Marukyu matcha, but they already run out of the like the one for the the usucha one. There's only half like the cooking grade left and people who wants the matcha for drinking, they just get the cooking grade because they don't know the difference, but they just know the brand.

Nicha · 1:01:00

Yeah. Which is quite interesting to see. We're just like, OK, like, do you want to try a matcha? And if you want to make drinks, maybe this one's better. Yeah, they did this. But like, it's quite interesting how this Marukyu trend is like, really, everyone's seeking for Marukyu matcha.

Zongjun · 1:01:20

Yeah. It's a little actually. I was just reflecting on this the other day because they put out this big announcement saying trying to crack down on resellers. Like another way of looking at this is that Marukyu is pricing undervalue.

Zongjun · 1:01:36

So like, the moment someone buys it, it is literally worth more on the secondary market because there's so much demand and it is so scarce. And it's because you see other industries doing this like, you know, famously like the luxury industry like Rolex or Hermes purposely price their products below their value. And the moment you walk out with it, it automatically becomes worth more on the secondary market. And it's a really interesting phenomenon that's now happening to matcha, which is like bizarre cuz it's a perishable product. And I understand what they're cracking down on resellers. Who knows what happened to those

Zongjun · 1:02:12

cans when you buy them on eBay, but it's an interesting choice that they're keeping suppressing prices very low. And I wonder when or if they want to harvest more of that value, because the way you crack down on the secondary market is by pricing to value so that when you buy it, right, like it's, you know, it's not automatically worth more the moment you, it's in your hands. Yeah, very convenient way for them to raise prices. So by the end of the day, I.

Ryan · 1:02:41

Mean, but it's also what the market is saying it's worth. Yeah, that's true. Then you're also like, then it becomes this elite thing and now you're pricing out tons of people like, so like what they're doing is very good for the average consumer if you can get your hands on it, keeping it an accessible price point. Curious to hear what your thoughts are on that in the industry that you work in.

Nicha · 1:03:00

Because like, I feel this really falls into like, consumer behavior, like space sphere around, like the scarcity and secondary market and the way people are deciding to price things. Yeah. I think it's so like for Thailand, there are so many retailer resellers that like got the matcha from Japan and they sell it like 10 times or even more, which is quite disheartening to see. And then, but I think we're the UK landscaped people, they sort of don't order matcha online from the Japanese brand that much because it's the shipping costs quite a lot. So they tend to seek for kind of the option of like UK brand a lot more.

Nicha · 1:03:41

And I would say the pricing, people kind of know that if they get like the 8#8# matcha for 30 grams, which is probably similar to like 8 euros, 7-8 euros will be, that's going to be like the low quality 1. And especially if they get it from the Asian market, the price that they would see is quite reasonable for the good quality. It's probably like 15 and higher. And we use like the first harvest matcha and it's also stone milled.

Nicha · 1:04:13

But because we feel like we want to make matcha quite accessible and more like a good margin, a lot of people actually say it's quite affordable. I wish it. Yeah. Like I would say like our matcha is really good value for money. And but we're trying to sort of shift a little bit more because like there will be higher cost on matcha. Like like the farmers already told us that there's like 30% increase in the fertilizer price and cost in everything and lower yield.

Nicha · 1:04:43

So we sort of need to prompt people that and anchor people that it will be a little bit more. I think it's easy to convince people who knows what is the good quality of matcha is and the pricing, but it's hard to convert people who not used to good quality matcha to.

Ryan · 1:05:00

Yeah, it'll make that even harder that yeah, yeah, 10. Pounds or more? Yeah. Yeah. But when you talk about consumer pricing, I guess like sometimes when you're on the as as like brand like trying to sell it, you might look to what it costs and then like add a margin on then to like consumers you don't know, they don't know any of like the background costs.

Zongjun · 1:05:21

So they have to like have different area for how they decide what's value for money, what's not. And a lot of the times that comes from either having like a reference point to like another product, like if it's in a cafe, comparing it to how much coffee costs, or, you know, just like what else is out there in the market or kind of if there's any signals of quality and stuff like people are used to like signals like organic. Like, even though matcha wouldn't have like umami flavour that you get from an organic product, certain words like that would make them think, Oh, I can pay more like, you know, organic.

Zongjun · 1:05:58

And then you can introduce new things like ceremony or grade is a big thing, which is like, even though it's a bit of a marketing term, which is kind of like boost the price of the product made it seem like, Oh, this is, this is something I can pay more for. So this yeah, they I mean, they have to go. It's interesting.

Zongjun · 1:06:15

Like it's like the pricing kind of it works very differently for when you look at it for a consumer versus when you're selling it. I think. So when we try to like think about pricing, it's good to try and think about it from the consumer who comes at it perspective who doesn't know all the background costs and how they would look at how they would compare against other products. It's.

Francis · 1:06:32

Very interesting because you know it works both ways for from a consumer perspective perspective, right? Like you would match a, you know, a high quality product with, you know, higher or more appropriate price tag. But also on the other hand, you would expect a high quality product to be more expensive. So sometimes you probably want to give the product a slightly higher price to reflect its quality. Yeah, to the consumer.

Zongjun · 1:07:00

Yeah, that's that's something in like behavioral science called like the price quality heuristic, where it's like if something's priced higher, then people will use that as a kind of rule of thumb to say, oh, it's probably high.

Zongjun · 1:07:12

It's an indicator of high quality. It's not the quality for, it's not them going, oh, this is high quality socially, price high. It's actually the other way sometimes going this is price high, so it must be high quality. Yeah, yeah.

Francis · 1:07:25

And then they convinced themselves because they've already spent the money. What situation I was in. But I remembered like, it was some touristy place. It was very famous. And I heard, like a lot of people say, oh, this is so good. And I'm thinking to the back of my mind, well, this is kind of expensive.

Ryan · 1:07:41

I don't think this is very good. And I think they're just convincing themselves how incredible it is because, like, they spent money to get here and like to pay for this thing. Was that in? Was that in Paris? I think it was in like a wine context or something.

Francis · 1:07:55

Yeah, I forget what the context was. I remember how I was think feeling at the time. Yeah. You sort of need to justify that. Oh, like I already paid this amount, so it got to be good. Yeah. Hard though, because like when you are starting the business in the market where the matcha knowledge is still like not quite widespread. And then you also want to get out there to so people can buy, buy your product.

Francis · 1:08:21

If you said like price too high, but people don't really know your brand just yet, it's quite hard to sell. Like in the first few months that we started, it's really hard to get people to buy a matcha because they they think like a lot of feedback we got like, oh this is quite expensive like sampling in Japan Centre because they already they only have like matcha for like £8.

Francis · 1:08:41

Yeah, I mean, because it's the context isn't so because when we were first selling it, we it wasn't, ours wasn't that expensive, but it was the most expensive like in the shop at the time. So it like looked really expensive compared to what they had because yeah, they just had some like cheaper, cheaper versions.

Francis · 1:08:57

But now they have like more expensive versions. So it doesn't look as expensive. And there's some people saying and like, oh, this is really like affordable match, which I kind of don't like. I don't like, I don't want people to like, say, to use the word well, I don't want it to be affordable, but I don't want it to be like that, to be the main descriptor of it as affordable. You know, yeah.

Zongjun · 1:09:15

Because that has different connotations. Yeah. It's tricky. Yeah. How do you prime people to think quality? Yeah. I mean, we've, we've spoken with other business owners in like different categories also producing natural products.

Zongjun · 1:09:29

Like no, people like in the olive oil industry, like have an olive oil brand. It's like a similar thing in a way where they're trying to source from farmers in Italy and then and then sell it under their brand. Cool. OK.

Zongjun · 1:09:41

Yeah. But that they had, they had like they the way they priced that olive oil and they had like some sales and then there was like a there was a shortage of olive oil because there was just wasn't a high yield for that year in the harvest of olive oil.

Zongjun · 1:09:53

So their prices have to go up. But when they put the prices up, they actually sold more at the higher price than they were like the previous year become like there's like an olive oil shortage. And then it was like people like really want the oil more. So then the next year they had there was a much higher yield and so there was more available.

Nicha · 1:10:14

So really should have put the prices down. The people say, are you going to put the prices down? It's like no, because it's of more elevated price. That's good for. Them. Yeah, it's really interesting to see that in the Western world there are quite a lot more products that they trying to do, sourcing from small farms and introducing nuances like olive oil. They also like a trend in that as well. This one is from Greece, this one is from Italy. From this.

Ryan · 1:10:46

The single origin, it's interesting actually as well, seeing how many different food products work in a similar way that you might not have always expected because she'd like food products And it's like, it's obviously completely different experience tasting it or using it.

Ryan · 1:10:59

But the actual, if you have it, if you're a brand who uses that product, the actual experience of like running back has a lot of similarities. Yeah. I mean, I think ultimately like you're trying like giving someone the context to understand why it's good, like to do their own self evaluation, why is this good?

Nicha · 1:11:17

And like cultivar region, like all of these things processing, we can all borrow and learn from each other across like these industries. Yeah. And that's, yeah, exactly like because when you have like a brand as well, it's like we don't make anything like it's made by, well, it's manufactured by the farmers.

Nicha · 1:11:34

So other people might have like a food or drink product where they're like making a drink or something with a certain recipe. We are just. So all we're doing really is just like time to sell a story about the well we're curating the matcha that we think is like really high, high quality.

Ryan · 1:11:49

And then we're just selling the story of it and showing them why they should, why they should buy it and trying to get them to appreciate matcha from from where we're sorted from. It's awesome. Well, it's a really important part of the value chain because like, I guess what all of like everyone who's focused on specialty, like we're creating a new market. We're creating a new type of consumer that's making purchasing decisions and evaluating and consumption behavior on a very different set of axes than someone who just wants it in a bubble tea or in a random latte or someone who wants it for a tea ceremony for

Nicha · 1:12:23

that matter, right? Like it's a different market, but like that market needs and the context basically. Yeah, yeah. And it's quite interesting, like experience and when you come into the, when you come into the industry, there might be, there's a balance between like selling, selling to people in a way and what people are already accustomed to. So like the, the common way, like the popular way to experience matcha is through like the matcha lattes, a lot of milk and without appreciating the different codes of ours. But when, when you, when you want to sell something new, you have to kind of sell in a way in

Nicha · 1:12:56

which they're not, which isn't their most, their most popular way of like consuming or something because you are trying to sell something new. That makes sense. So it's kind of like, but then also you don't want to be if you're, if you kind of sell to people in a way which is like completely alien to them. It doesn't.

Nicha · 1:13:10

It's not something which they're accustomed to do or they have any kind of experience with, then they might not, they might not, they might not resonate with them as much. So there's like a balance between giving them something new or resonating with what their interests are.

Ryan · 1:13:24

Yeah. Yeah, yeah. Probably. You'll probably need a little bit of both. Along the way, yeah, A. Difficult needle to thread. You know, we struggle with that too, like all the time actually, because like you have to meet people where they're at. Yeah.

Ryan · 1:13:41

And even on the podcast, like mostly think that we're speaking to like a B2B audience and people or like consumers who already know a lot about like all the various aspects recipe matcha like do we define honzu shaded every time that we talk about it? Do we like describe what an usu is every time we use that word?

Ryan · 1:14:02

Like for half of the audience, probably it looks like annoying, and for the other half it's extremely helpful and like, yeah. Yeah. But, you know, it's it really, by the end of the day depends on, you know, what you care and who you care about.

Ryan · 1:14:17

It will act almost as a natural filter. Yeah, to filter out the audience that you wanted to have. Yeah, exactly. Yeah, Yeah. Like we were not gonna can or cannot reduce the price even further to capture like people who say, oh, this is expensive, you know, yeah. That's just never going to be your consumers. Yeah, Yeah, that's true.

Nicha · 1:14:40

And I think an interesting point when now that we're talking about this is like there's a big cultures of macho gurlies in the West. I've never seen that before in Thailand because actually most of the matcha cafe owners seem to be like men who revolutionize like the way of drinking matcha.

Nicha · 1:14:59

And also when I go to the cafe with my friends, there's a mixed group of like, there's a lot of men and not just. Girls, yeah, it's a more gender balance. I've noticed that too. Yeah, yeah, or even in like back in the day, samurai like drink matcha.

Zongjun · 1:15:14

Yeah, yeah. Primarily a men's activity. Yeah, because expensive as well. We were just talking with someone in Australia about that who does a lot of pop ups and she was saying the number of like young teenage girls that are coming up to the booth dragging the parents saying I want this matcha, like mom, dad, taste the matcha.

Zongjun · 1:15:32

She made such an interesting observation that just completely blew my mind and kind of feels obvious now is that like this new generation of adolescence is forming a very different relationship with caffeine and that like they want a more balanced energy profile. They want something with some functional benefits and instead of getting hooked on coffee, you know when you're 14151617, when you're kind of getting more exposed to like adult like the caffeine culture that we all live in and like have like a lot of people like depend on and they're forming that relationship with matcha and not. And and that's like a entire

Zongjun · 1:16:11

generation. And they're impacting their parents. And also like, imagine their kids will be growing up in that culture too. So this whole culture is going to last for many, many years in the future, probably never disappeared.

Zongjun · 1:16:26

Be the dominant culture. Like if you project out the number of people that that's happening to, like even my sister who's seven years younger than me, that's what all of her friends want to drink. Like they don't know anything about tea. They're not particularly interested in Japanese culture. Like it's fascinating, like going home and like, you know, sometimes like her friends are around and I'm like, oh, whoa, wow.

Zongjun · 1:16:47

And they know quite a bit about matcha, like more than you would think, probably more than like the same age group knows about coffee that drinks coffee every. Yeah. Yeah, you. Think that will extend to like men, women going forward. What do you think?

Francis · 1:17:03

I think so too. I yeah, I don't see why not. Yeah, it's very interesting. You know, like it's really a internationalization movement or a moment for matcha because, you know, for coffee originally from Ethiopia. But, you know, I've been not too many people know about traditional Ethiopian culture history while drinking coffee.

Francis · 1:17:22

Yeah. And that's going to happen too much in the future, too. It will be lifted up from its the culture of birth into a more, you know, nationless and cultureless element on its own. That will happen slowly. Yeah, and it also expand to other kind of Japanese cultural elements as well. Like people now look for a different experience like a cabana and matcha.

Francis · 1:17:47

And we just really, it's kind of beautiful moments when you like kind of kind of introduce other aspects of mindfulness practices for. Sure. Yeah, you're. Having an international moment. Yeah, definitely. Yeah. I mean, that's another interesting because it's kind of like a slightly different element, but also interesting element is like the different the philosophy around match and then like tea ceremony and stuff like bringing that in because we try and bring in a little bit of that in the match tasting experience, even though a lot of it's focused on the different cultivars. I guess that's like, and that's

Francis · 1:18:21

like slightly different like Strand to like just focusing on the cultivars and the farming and the production and stuff. There's just a lot of different elements to matcha, which you can kind of explore and stories you can tell, you know?

Francis · 1:18:33

It adds so much depth, yeah. Yeah, it's a gateway. It's a gateway towards many things. That's what make, I mean, I think that's what makes matcha so unique compared to a lot of other things. Like there's this some South American herb called yerba mate that's caffeinated. But like as far as I know, there's not like a huge consumption culture or like this really rich tradition of consumption like we see in matcha in like the impact that that's had culturally, at least within Japan. But there's probably all of these different like plants and that have various functional properties that just don't have the cultural richness which

Francis · 1:19:13

it's, it really does make it endless to explore. Like there is something there are pathways to go down to expand on, you know? Like there's so many elements from like across the supply chain, like from planting, harvesting, producing and consuming Like you have chasen and like there's a cultures like craft.

Ryan · 1:19:34

Unrelated. Yeah, yeah. Like and like, Oh my God, everything. Yeah. All right, so moving forward, what's the plan for Haru Matcha? Yeah. So I mean, we've got so many different ideas for how we want to expand. I think like one of the one of our dreams or probably like our biggest dream is to have like our own, like things where we have we curate a matcha menu where we show the different cultivars.

Nicha · 1:20:02

And so people can really like experience and different cultivars and we can like talk them through the tasting notes. We kind of like because that's such a, it's a difficult place to go in, to go in like straight away without like significant.

Nicha · 1:20:16

Funds we're kind of like explored this place of doing these like pop ups and tasting experiences and having our own brand. So I think like for for the foreseeable future, we're just going to try and do more of these pop up events, like working in more, more markets to kind of test this experience of like taking through like the different cultivars, different regions and work in partnerships with people with different cafes to kind of like sell this experience in a little bit more as well.

Nicha · 1:20:44

But yeah, we just really love like combining the experience of tasting matcha and appreciation for the quality, the nuance and the depth of flavor that you can get with different cultivars and different matcha as opposed to just like drinking matcha generic product. Yeah.

Nicha · 1:21:02

Yeah, that's wonderful. I'm sure like along the way you probably end up finding a lot of peers and like minded people that you know can share the journey experience too. Yeah, it's really fun to see how they react on like what we tell them. And so we just feel so happy like seeing. And I think another factor is that we so like after we factor in like the problems of the matcha shortage, we also probably have to think about how we're going to tackle that. So we would like to be like the the UK's brand specialized in Japanese tea.

Nicha · 1:21:36

So we want to also expand to other kind of tea that is still very, very good quality, like gyokuro or like even like, like, yeah. And hold the shot in the war because we also try like kukicha from Uji and Yame or so it tastes different. Yeah, a lot.

Ryan · 1:21:54

Of nuances around every single yeah, yeah. That's wonderful. Hojicha in particular, I think it's a under under like explored rabbit hole in the yeah, especially the differences. It's like people just talk about hojicha hojicha powder but like the different expressions or leaf compositions or roast levels like. Yeah, yeah.

Ryan · 1:22:18

Yeah, yeah, still a lot of things to learn. Yeah. Yeah, yeah. Oh, it's exciting. Congrats. Yeah. Really lovely. Looking for. Yeah. I'd love to come to London, come to one of your workshops sometime. It'd be. Yeah. That'd be cool.

Ryan · 1:22:31

Yeah. Yeah, cool. Thank you so much for coming on. Love the work that you're doing. And for all the listeners, thanks for listening. And if you enjoyed it, please consider sharing it with a friend. And that's all we got.

Zongjun · 1:22:42

Thanks. See you in the next episode. Yeah. Thank you.