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Interview with No Bad Matcha, James · Specialty Matcha Podcast

0:00
Hello and welcome to the Specialty Matcha Podcast.
0:02
My name is Ryan, this is my Coho Sungjin.
0:04
Hello. Hello.
0:05
Who also goes by Sam and we're the cofounders of Sunco Matcha
0:08
Products. Yeah.
0:09
We launched this podcast to discuss our learning journey,
0:11
Matcha, share startup stories and interview experts.
0:14
And today we have James from No Bad Matcha joining us.
0:18
Welcome. James Hi, guys.
0:20
Thank you for having me. To give you a background about
0:23
myself, I am a cafe owner and the founder of Nobad Matcha and
0:28
I am based in a small province here in the Philippines.
0:32
Nice. Yeah So about my story, I
0:35
started a cafe way back 2022 so like 3 years ago.
0:40
Fueled by the lack of good matcha or just authentic matcha
0:45
from where I am at. So upon launching A matcha latte
0:49
product that used actual real matcha, we gained reputation.
0:54
So with our good, our matcha is. So with that we started to
0:58
introduce and share authentic matcha to cafes around us inside
1:02
our province, making it more accessible to people around us.
1:07
So for no bad matcha, we really focus solely on cafes, slow bars
1:12
and pop ups so we'll be able to reach more number of people
1:16
compared to selling matcha to individuals.
1:18
It also gives us and our partner parms that actually runs that
1:23
the matcha is actively moving and not stealing away in
1:26
someone's bridge. That's nice.
1:27
Only good matcha. No bad matcha.
1:30
And like most things, it sounds like it came out of some.
1:32
Like personal frustration. Like the founding of it.
1:35
Yeah, like the inability to find good matcha.
1:39
When I started the business, it's like there are 20 cafes
1:42
around me in my province, but not a single one serving real
1:46
matcha. But matcha is riddled upon
1:49
everyone's menu. It's like everyone's mislabeling
1:53
matcha and. When was that?
1:54
It's like 2022, 2023 and around 2020.
1:58
Three, yeah. Did you fall into matcha in the
2:00
1st place? Where?
2:01
Where did you grow an appreciation for it?
2:03
I I first experienced matcha around 20/20/10 when Starbucks
2:09
introduced matcha in the Philippines.
2:11
That's my first experience with matcha.
2:14
Years after that, my next experience would be chocolates
2:18
matcha. Chocolates Kit Kat matcha.
2:21
OK, I'm bought home by my dad who works as a seaman or sea
2:25
failure. So after that, around 2019 when
2:29
I had the opportunity to travel to Japan for work, I experienced
2:33
much of person and I actually saw how it was processed.
2:37
And I was actually surprised how hard it is to make much.
2:41
The work involved, not just about the farming, but also the
2:44
processing. It's like very eye opening for
2:48
someone who. Yeah.
2:50
Where did you travel in Japan to see all the matcha production?
2:53
The matcha production I saw was at Michio Japan Initio.
2:57
Yeah, yeah, very cool. It's like a beef farm tour that
3:02
is included in our vacation package.
3:05
OK. Lucky you, you went there before
3:08
all of these hypes. Now it's really crowded.
3:12
Yeah, much more off the beaten path.
3:15
Cool. So would love to learn about how
3:18
you've seen the evolution of matcha in the Philippines and it
3:22
being adopted and you made a lot of references to fake matcha or
3:26
not real matcha. So what what was being served
3:30
and how has that been changing and how is the consumer
3:33
awareness kind of followed that path?
3:35
Yeah, so back in 2010 when I first tried Matcha with
3:38
Starbucks, it was really good for me, was actually decent.
3:43
Then what happened is around 2015 onwards, there was a sudden
3:47
fluctuation of milk tea or bubble tea shops, what we called
3:53
the bubble tea era or the milk tea era.
3:56
There was a price war because of the number of shops opening up.
4:01
There was a price war and to lower down the cost, much has
4:05
been treated as an artificial favoring, just like what they
4:09
did to other bubble tea laborers.
4:11
So yeah, Macha was really bastardized here in the
4:15
Philippines because of too much Milky shops serving cheap
4:19
products that uses cheap ingredients.
4:22
So what I encounter most of the time are generic green tea
4:25
powders, the one that are almost pale yellow to pale green and
4:30
chalky and sandy in texture. Then after that era, we are
4:34
currently here for what we like to call the coffee shop era.
4:38
So for the past five years, it's like coffee shops are opening up
4:42
everywhere in the Philippines. Local coffee shops, big coffee
4:46
shops, name it all. And I have a friend who is
4:49
actually an importer and distributor of espresso
4:53
machines. And he told me that the business
4:56
is really doing good for us because for a month we are
4:59
selling around hundreds to thousands of espresso machines,
5:03
meaning that a lot of coffee shops are opening up and like
5:07
90% of their customers are coffee owners.
5:11
And there was a small percentage for home Brewers who actually
5:15
wants to buy an espresso machine for home.
5:17
So recently this last few months, we've seen a lot of Cafe
5:22
centric, matcha centric cafes that are opening up that is
5:26
challenging the market for matcha.
5:29
So matcha centric stores are actually eating up the market
5:33
share for matcha of coffee shops that are serving fake matcha.
5:38
So what we have in this season right now, there are a lot of
5:42
matcha places that serves real matcha.
5:45
So the coffee shops that are not serving real matcha are being
5:48
challenged to upgrade their to upgrade to real matcha.
5:52
And what we also observed is the sudden influx of matcha
5:55
homegroupers fueled by the lack of cafes serving real matcha.
6:00
Yeah, you can see it in all over TikTok, Instagram, reals.
6:04
There are a lot of content creators making matcha at home
6:07
just because they can make it better than cafes.
6:10
And that's what that's what I observed.
6:12
That's really interesting, I like how you did find that in
6:15
eras too. It's.
6:18
It's interesting. From bubble tea shops, Yeah,
6:21
from bubble tea shops, the price war was passed down to the
6:26
coffee shops right now, actually.
6:28
So some coffee shops are fighting for prices, while some
6:32
are the specialty coffee shops are fighting for quality, but.
6:36
Yeah. The knowledge about matcha was
6:39
being left behind and just recently a lot of the educators
6:44
are doing the right thing, doing the good thing for us, for the
6:49
enjoyers, for people making matcha, for the farmers to
6:53
educate people about what is real matcha.
6:56
Very important work. We were talking with some people
7:00
who had met some tea farmers in, I think it was in Yamai and very
7:04
like famous producer and the the producer was saying they're
7:08
asking them like what do you think of?
7:10
What do you fear about the shortage and what's going on
7:14
with all this matcha hype? And he used the word scared, but
7:17
it was scared that people weren't going to ever learn the
7:20
taste of true matcha. And it's exactly this problem
7:24
where you have a race to the top and a race to the bottom with
7:27
the price wars. And it's like the bottom piece
7:30
where the people who, you know, are much more cost conscious
7:33
getting served a product that is being called matcha but just
7:36
isn't. It's, it's an interesting
7:39
phenomenon. It actually seems very common
7:41
across just Asia in general as like this whole idea of coffee
7:46
and cafes and now moving into matcha has exploded because
7:50
we've noticed a similar phenomenon in China.
7:53
We've noticed it in Thailand, where there's this race to the
7:56
top or race to the bottom in these very new segments of these
8:00
small businesses that just didn't exist like 10 years ago.
8:04
Yeah. Definitely, for sure.
8:06
It's really, you know, by the end of the day, you know, what
8:09
do you exactly care, right? It's you care about the quantity
8:13
you care about, you know, serving more or you care about
8:17
the quality or you care about, you know, consumer education.
8:20
So yeah, actually curious to learn about your sourcing
8:23
philosophy, James. Like when you source matcha
8:26
like, what do you consider as like good matcha or up to your
8:30
standard of matcha for? Sourcing matcha, we try to stick
8:34
with the farms that harvest once or twice a year only.
8:38
And for our customers, we try to be as transparent to our clients
8:42
with the information that we are allowed to share.
8:45
Because some actually some farmers are really secretive
8:48
when it comes to their matcha. Most especially what culture
8:52
bars are inside your plant. Some of them really answers
8:57
daily and some will not even care to answer.
9:00
Like this is trade secret we are not allowed to share.
9:05
And also, yeah, for quality control, we have an internal
9:10
quality control. For example, we've been batches
9:13
of matcha, so for every batch, 1K will be given to my cafe
9:19
here, my personal cafe, and then we will check our tasting notes,
9:24
our texture, if it actually lines up to what we have been
9:27
getting for the past. Year.
9:28
That's awesome. That's like doing your own
9:31
internal quality control per batch.
9:33
Do you ever notice big changes or is it generally pretty
9:37
consistent? Generally pretty consistent but
9:40
this year actually gave us better matcha.
9:43
This harvest season it's like the match has been.
9:46
The farmer told me it's because of the season and not really
9:49
about the blend. They haven't changed anything
9:52
with their blending, only the harvest.
9:54
Interesting. So they're blending to keep it
9:56
the same cultivars, but they're not blending to keep it the same
9:59
flavor, even though the cultivar flavor profiles change because
10:03
of the harvest season. That's an interesting like
10:06
blending concept, because usually it's like the other way
10:08
around. It's interesting.
10:11
Usually you try to maintain flavor consistency.
10:13
But it's cool from a specialty lens because like all of your
10:16
accounts, then you can be like, hey, like, then you introduce
10:19
like the concept of vintage and like, this year is much better
10:22
than last year. Here are tasting notes.
10:24
Here's the difference. Like it's a, but it also sets a
10:28
really cool expectation that it's not going to necessarily
10:32
always taste exactly the same every year.
10:34
It's something that we noticed was a real problem.
10:38
We used to work a lot in the craft, artisanal industries, and
10:41
it was a big problem for craft beer because craft beer has
10:44
variable ingredients. The hops every year can be
10:48
different, the malt, the barley can be very different every
10:52
year, every season, and it's really hard to maintain
10:55
consistency. But in the wine industry, no one
10:57
expects consistency because there's some good years, there's
11:00
some bad years. But like, setting that idea in
11:03
people's minds early is like a really cool concept because
11:07
just, you know, it really should be the case in Matcha, yes.
11:10
I agree with that. It's really cool.
11:12
So I I would like to share more about the challenges when it
11:16
comes to specialty coffee cafes because we have a lot of new
11:20
clients that are from specialty coffee industry.
11:24
So to share more about this, actually some copy owners
11:28
specialty cafe, specialty coffee cafe owners actually have high
11:32
respect and care when it comes to coffee, but the same amount
11:36
of respect and care is lost when it comes to their non coffee
11:40
options, including matcha. So what we do, how we approach
11:43
them oftentimes is give them we give them the hard truth that
11:47
they are mislabeling if they are putting matcha in their menu and
11:51
serving something that is clearly not matcha.
11:54
And for specialty coffee cafes, mislabeling is a big deal and it
11:58
proving reputation. So for us at No Bad Matcha, we
12:02
need to start giving cafe owners the idea that matcha is not just
12:07
like any other generic green tea, and we need to emphasize
12:11
that it is a higher quality green tea with a more meticulous
12:14
process, giving it a name of its own.
12:16
Therefore, by labeling something as matcha in their menu, they
12:20
are already giving a certain standard of expectation to the
12:23
customers. Yeah, that makes sense.
12:26
And is that generally received well or sometimes they're a bit
12:30
defensive? When dealing with coffee owners
12:33
in the specialty coffee in the street, some of them really have
12:36
high egos when it comes to quality.
12:38
So what we do most of the time is we always bring a pack of
12:42
samples and we try to compare my side and seeing that their
12:47
quality is not standing up to real much, it's like I need to
12:50
change ass up. You can't argue with what's in
12:55
the cup. Yeah, yeah, really interesting.
12:58
So how have you seen like the workflows I guess the good, the
13:02
bad and the ugly when it comes to like a matcha program and how
13:06
the barista is actually how their stations set up?
13:09
I will serve a lot of workflows for cafes that involves a nice
13:14
matcha set up. Actually, some cafes are willing
13:17
to add additional manpower just to have someone dedicated to
13:21
matcha alone. So when it comes to workflow,
13:25
there is no single approach when it comes to this.
13:27
So we try to get information from them like how many cups are
13:31
you trying to serve per day, the volume of customers per hour and
13:35
your target turn around time. Recently, Coffee Century cafes
13:38
are now starting to have separate matcha stations,
13:41
separate barista, while some are adjusting workflows to
13:45
accommodate matcha without having to hire additional
13:48
manpower. So they are not making matcha
13:51
the traditional way with whisk. Some are using blenders, some
13:54
are using hand whisk just to give space to their matcha.
13:59
So when it comes to consistency, cafes with dedicated manpower
14:04
and dedicated matcha stations will give give better quality
14:09
and better consistency compared to those who have that.
14:12
And you see like most people using like variable temperature
14:15
kettle and scales and like the same coffee hardware just
14:19
purposed for matcha, you know, of course, other than the whisk
14:22
and the bowl, but this type of thing.
14:24
Yeah, yeah, I assured that too. But for some cafes that do not
14:29
have a dedicated matcha station, they usually adjust the recipe
14:33
like they do cold whisking and they sometimes use variable
14:38
kettle temperatures like close to what they use with coffee.
14:44
Got it. So around 90 for some cafes.
14:48
OK. I recommend brewing at around 80
14:50
to 85, but I always tell them that there really is no, no rule
14:55
about that about temperatures. You can calibrate your match
15:00
however you like. Just give enough care and try to
15:04
taste or cup your matcha when brewing at higher temperatures.
15:08
It will serve up to your standards.
15:10
Yeah, yeah. Is most of the machos in the
15:13
Philippines served in a latte or is it americano like just water
15:17
based? What's the ratio of what people
15:20
order typically? It's a latte, like I'd say 95 to
15:24
99% of orders will be much alotted.
15:28
Yeah, well, it's like the rest of the world.
15:30
Yeah. Yeah, it's interesting.
15:32
I I've always found it weird that Japanese companies aren't
15:36
doing more investment in optimizing for matcha latte
15:41
because like so much is consumed with milk.
15:44
But I think all of their sensory and flavor measurement is not in
15:49
that application. It's yeah.
15:51
And like. Well.
15:52
It's it's hard because milk tastes different across
15:56
different countries too. That's so true.
15:58
Yeah, it's very different actually.
16:01
Yeah, that's a hard problem space.
16:02
Because even within. So much more room for growth.
16:05
So when you see all these coffee shops set up their matcha
16:09
program, do you necessarily see a impact or influence of their
16:14
coffee theory into a selecting matcha?
16:17
Like if some coffee shops preferred like more, you know,
16:19
roasted beans, would they like prefer yame versus uji and all
16:23
that? That is more of a location
16:26
issue. So here in my province, it's
16:29
like not necessarily with the prefecture from where the matcha
16:33
is coming from, but they are adjusting with their recipe.
16:36
So in my province from where I'm at, people like their matcha
16:40
latte with a balance profile. So just a little bit of
16:44
sweetener, a balance matcha and new creation.
16:47
Well, from other provinces, like from the one I recently handled
16:51
like two hours away from here, they like their matcha latte
16:55
sweet. So the sugar ratio is higher
16:58
than the usual, the matcha ratio is a little bit less and more
17:02
milk. While some other provinces would
17:04
like their matcha very hard. If you've been talking to Miss
17:09
Monique Pereira from Matcha Moment, she's from Batanga.
17:12
So people from up there have their version of coffee that
17:15
they call Baraka coffee, or it's like a very strong version of
17:19
coffee. So the recipe of the matcha up
17:22
there leans towards the more concentrated matcha.
17:26
Yeah, interesting. Interesting.
17:28
People have been adjusting recipes not yet with the
17:31
prefecture from the from where the matcha source and also not a
17:36
lot of matcha distributors are varying partner parms from
17:40
different prefectures. Feels like we're the early days
17:43
for a lot of that. It's like generally hard to find
17:47
like regional matcha sourcing I think.
17:50
And just in general at this point, other than maybe Bangkok,
17:53
like it seems like you have to do quite a bit of searching in
17:56
any other place in the world to get like these really regional
18:00
differences, so. Hard to find matcha in general.
18:04
Right now that's hard to find. Hard to find no bad matcha in
18:08
most places. How do you approach like recipe
18:11
development from like a consultant's point of view?
18:16
I recently had someone reach out and they emailed us.
18:19
I forget what country they were from but I think it was
18:22
somewhere in the Middle East and they were looking to open a
18:25
cafe. Wanted some like consultancy
18:28
help with recipe development and I wasn't exactly sure what to
18:32
tell them. It's like, you know you just
18:34
like adjust ratios until you get it right.
18:37
But like how do you approach that?
18:39
And like what's the question set that you ask someone if a
18:43
business comes to you and say I need help with my recipes, I
18:47
think it can be better. What should I start changing to
18:50
make adjustments? So for recipe development it all
18:54
boils boils down again to the volume of matcha you are trying
18:58
to serve. Ask them will you consider
19:00
yourself as a slow bar or a fast space cafe?
19:04
Because recipes can be adjusted based on the workflow.
19:07
So if you are using a hard risk, you are incorporating a lot of
19:12
air to your matches. So you need a higher mature
19:14
ratio. Make it taste like it is hand
19:17
whisk. Yeah, you have to adjust.
19:19
It also involves a lot of self tasting and a few group tasting
19:23
sessions after all, because it should also reflect your
19:27
interpretation of the drink. So when we make recipes for our
19:31
Cafe, it will always be. First it will have to pass my
19:36
tasting preferences. So if it pass my tasting
19:40
preferences, next I will let someone taste it.
19:43
Someone from a group. We have a very with coffee
19:46
clubbing here who helps us with the sensory aspects when it
19:49
comes to our drinks. So also in my experience and
19:53
other home groupers experience, homemade and natural ingredients
19:57
are what works best and that's as well with matcha Syrups with
20:01
artificial paperings are really unstable and hard to work with
20:05
when partnered, when partnered with authentic matcha based on
20:08
our experience only. It just, it doesn't balance well
20:12
with the artificial. OK, Yeah.
20:15
I have I experienced some cafes that are marketed as slow bars
20:19
but with the amount of people coming in, the baristas are
20:23
really pleasure to work fast and throw some things around.
20:27
So I always remind remind them that you are being marketed as a
20:31
slow bar so you have to up like it when two people are making a
20:35
decision in coming to your cafe. They always have in my neck.
20:39
This is a slow bar. I have to a lot like 10 to 20
20:43
minutes of my time just to get my dream.
20:46
Yeah. The expectations already set,
20:49
yes. Interesting.
20:50
So you run like a coffee, kind of like a local coffee
20:54
community, like with all the coffee and you do all the matcha
20:58
tasting with yeah, cool. So do you blending with any
21:01
educational kind of content like kind of like?
21:05
We're actually doing our workshops to different cafes,
21:09
but all of our workshops are focused solely on how much is
21:13
being treated on a cafe because there are different approaches
21:17
when it comes to matcha, there's a different approach for home
21:21
brewing and there's a different approach when you are at a cafe
21:24
set up. That's for sure.
21:26
Yeah, that's so true. What makes a good workflow from
21:29
like an efficiency point of view?
21:31
And a quality point of view. Yeah, and the quality?
21:35
For me best workflow will always have the setup that is very
21:39
minimalist. The only have to put what you
21:42
are bound to use for your workflow.
21:45
You will not have to add any additional gadgets or stuff that
21:50
will hinder you from working smoothly.
21:52
Also a recently amount of matcha products, amount of gadgets that
21:57
are coming has been very helpful for cafes.
22:01
Really it's like a life changer, life changing innovation for
22:06
them, like some hand whisk or matcha and also the one from
22:10
Subminimal, the the one that makes your milk textured nano
22:15
foamer, the one with the little screen.
22:17
On it, the little screen nano foamer, yeah, it can texture
22:21
like the beverage better than like any of the other blender
22:25
things that I've ever seen. It's really impressive.
22:28
And also when I go to new cafes that are interested in matcha, I
22:33
show them work flows that are too easy and make it not too
22:37
complicated for them to have an idea that matcha is not really
22:42
complicated. You have to make it approachable
22:45
for them to integrate matcha to Germany.
22:49
It's such a conundrum because like, in some senses, preparing
22:53
matchas can be very simple. But like when I talk to like new
22:57
consumers, like friends or friends of friends or something
23:01
like that, and they want to make matcha at home or in general,
23:05
and I have to start describing the steps.
23:07
I realize it like it's actually like a lot of it's also very
23:11
complicated. It's like, oh, you need to worry
23:13
about water temperature. You're going to need a scale.
23:16
You should probably buy a sifter.
23:17
You're going to need some kind of bowl, bowl or something.
23:20
Yeah, a lot of it's. Just you gotta refrigerate your
23:24
but don't put it in the freezer. But if you put it in the
23:27
freezer, bring it down to room temperature before you open the
23:30
like, there's all of this, these rules.
23:32
How do you like simplify that to adapt into workflows?
23:36
Because it must be so easy for like someone who hasn't gone
23:40
through this training to mess it up.
23:42
I think it's because we are comparing baristas, cafe owners,
23:46
to home Brewers. When you introduce matcha to
23:49
cafe owners, it's like an easier version of coffee for them.
23:52
So if they're serving espresso, they're serving for Ubers.
23:56
Matcha is like a an easy walk in the park for them.
23:59
Compared to explaining all of these matcha stuff to someone
24:03
who hasn't good coffee at home to someone who hasn't used a
24:07
espresso machine, it's really hard to grasp.
24:11
But for people with experience in cafes, I think it's like very
24:14
easy for them. These are pros, Ryan.
24:17
Yeah. Yeah, I get.
24:18
It's the point of reference, yeah.
24:21
Yeah, and actually I can see a lot of differences from matcha
24:25
homebrewers making matcha versus baristas making matcha.
24:29
It's like the baristas are making it simple, but it works.
24:33
Whereas for some homebrewers you will see the steps to be a much
24:37
more complicated, but there is what is like the same.
24:41
Yeah, I know exactly what you mean.
24:43
But yeah, I mean, it's so true. But it's also like, even in the
24:46
States, you know, it's you. You would think that someone
24:50
that knows how to operate an espresso machine could avoid the
24:53
basic mistakes of matcha. I think for 50% of the cafes
24:57
it's a very, very, very sad corner.
25:01
How large would you say the average like space footprint of
25:05
people's matcha station in the cafes that you have interact
25:09
with? Like what's the percentage
25:10
compared to the coffee sack? Comprising the bar area, it's
25:13
like 80% will be dedicated to coffee in the 20% OK is for
25:20
matcha. That's a pretty significantly
25:23
large compared to some of the other we're seeing.
25:26
So like they, they give it a lot of space.
25:29
That's. And do you see people mix, use,
25:32
you know, equipments between coffee and matcha or do they
25:35
usually have a dedicated set of preparation for matcha?
25:40
They usually have a dedicated. Set.
25:42
Oh, OK, OK. Wow.
25:46
Wow, people are getting serious. Yeah.
25:49
For cafes, matcha centric cafes, it goes the other way around.
25:53
So it will be 80% is for March and 20% is for.
25:56
There we go. Yeah.
25:58
So when you have like if you go in, if you're like a mystery
26:02
shopper or undercover consumer and you go into a cafe and you
26:06
chitchat with the barista or the person at the counter taking
26:10
your order, asking about their matcha program, what's the
26:13
quality of responses and the confidence that you've seen?
26:17
And then how do you like address a lot of the problems that you
26:21
see with like the trainings that you do in staff education?
26:25
A large number of baristas are very dismissive when it comes to
26:29
matcha. So asking questions about
26:31
matcha, they will come up with answers that I don't know.
26:35
Our supplier doesn't talk much about the matcha, like it's been
26:40
given around to them, just like any other powder ingredients.
26:44
So for matcha education, what I see that is lacking to new
26:49
baristas is the storage of matcha.
26:51
Also, for cafe owners, some are even storing their matcha in
26:55
transparent jars along with their cocoa powders, their prep
26:59
bases. And also, I like to point out
27:01
that matcha is a suspension. Many baristas are thinking that
27:06
matcha is just like coffee. You're extracting something.
27:09
Yeah. The truth is it is a suspension.
27:11
You have to keep in mind how a suspension works just in making
27:15
your drinks and making your recipes.
27:18
Like some of them are very curious, why is my matcha powder
27:22
settling down after some few minutes?
27:24
Is it fake? We get a lot of questions like
27:26
that. Also ratios and water
27:29
temperature. I'd like to tell them that.
27:32
Use it as a guide but always feel free to explore.
27:36
What will happen to your matter if it goes around 90° Celsius
27:40
25100? Because different matcha will
27:43
react different way from different temperatures.
27:46
Also the ratio. Yeah, you can pretty much adjust
27:49
the ratio of your matcha based on how fine it was cried from
27:53
the factory. Interesting, so you do thicker
27:55
ratios for less fine particles? We can do much more thicker
28:01
ratios if the matcha powder is cried fine than usual.
28:05
Yeah, because it's more. Power, because if you distribute
28:08
your ratio to something like one is to 20 and your matcha is like
28:12
coarsely grinded, it will be sandy and chalky to the texture.
28:17
To teach about texturing when it comes to hot matcha lattes,
28:22
yeah, that's that one is what is pretty much laughing.
28:25
Even in cafes that are matcha centric, when you order
28:28
something like a hot matcha latte, you'll get something with
28:31
good matcha but has bad texture. Interesting.
28:36
Yeah, I can see that. Yeah.
28:38
Do you guys try to make your own maca lattes at home or are you
28:43
more of a sucha guy? Mostly with sucha nowadays,
28:48
yeah. Or an Americano kind of thing.
28:50
But I do occasionally do some sensory work on lattes.
28:55
I'm really fascinated by the flavor profile transformation
29:01
that happens when you mix matcha with milk.
29:03
And I think that a lot of people on the Internet are too
29:08
reductive in saying that you're covering up subtlety and nuance
29:12
and you're you're really just changing the taste.
29:16
And I've noticed that you can mix some really high end matcha
29:20
and I do it in very small quantities, like I do 1g.
29:24
I make a very concentrated thing and just put in splashes of milk
29:27
to taste what happens. And there are some really
29:31
interesting transformations on completely non bitter matcha
29:35
with the splash of milk. You get flavors that just did
29:38
not exist before that are just as interesting as when it's with
29:43
water. Like sometimes it's kind of
29:45
cheesy, almost like a lot of this very umami heavy matchas
29:51
with a splash of oat milk. It's almost leans into like a
29:54
massacre bone, kind of like Italian, like sweet creamy
30:00
cheeses. Like a cream.
30:02
Or yeah, like cream cheese or these like cream cheese foam
30:05
that you see in some of the high end like bubble tea places.
30:09
Like it's there's a lot of work to be explored on the high end.
30:13
And like you don't just need second harvest that is like very
30:17
just bitter and like this first harvest stuff can taste really
30:21
good. I think a lot of people are
30:24
because like some matcha like it does cover some, you know,
30:28
flavor characteristic of some good matcha, right?
30:31
And I feel like that the argument really shouldn't be
30:34
that don't use good matcha for latte.
30:37
I think it should be like we should try to make some good
30:40
matcha designed for be put into a latte scenario.
30:43
Like latte deserves good quality matcha.
30:46
But you know, you have to think it the other way around, right?
30:49
Not like trying to find matcha to be put into not latte, but
30:53
trying trying to, you know, design a good matcha or matcha
30:56
flavor profile specifically for latte.
30:59
You actually see that, you know, in some of the older tea houses
31:02
already doing that, Like, holy shit, man.
31:05
But I feel like more people should be doing it.
31:07
It's it's really a gateway for people to get into the world of
31:12
matcha. Like so many people got into
31:14
matcha because of matcha latte. And you know, this deserves a
31:18
better name, a better flavor. Yeah.
31:20
And at all the traditional companies, if they do have a
31:23
matcha latte or a lot of them, it's just the lowest and
31:27
cheapest thing, it's their confectionery grade or barista
31:32
third. Harvest sometimes.
31:33
Yeah. Yeah, Third harvest, maybe even
31:35
fourth harvest now it's much shortage.
31:38
We've heard, we've heard some horror stories about that stuff.
31:41
And like, where is the quality spectrum?
31:44
Like it's, it's like they cap it at a certain point and then
31:48
they're only thinking about usacha drinkers, which is really
31:51
a shame because it's not what most magic consumers are
31:54
anymore. Like, yeah, there's some usacha
31:57
drinker. I mean, we're usacha drinkers.
31:59
But like, that's like a very small percentage of the market.
32:05
It's just the historical market maybe.
32:07
So that's like still what they're thinking about.
32:09
Yeah, they did to try to see it at the Milky point of view.
32:14
The tea that was used for milk tea was not incorporated with
32:18
milk. It will not boom at all.
32:20
Just like matcha. If you if we will be dismissed
32:23
when it comes to matcha lattes, adding milk, adding some flavor
32:28
enhancers, the matcha will really not grow as something as
32:32
a part of a coffee beverage. I guess the the whole coffee
32:37
kind of mindset also blends into the perception of quality in a
32:41
specialty coffee. You don't necessarily expect to
32:44
put high quality coffee into like milk or yeah, you expect to
32:48
drink drinking meat. So I guess it happens both ways,
32:51
yeah. I don't.
32:52
Know how it happened? I think it deserves a better
32:54
name and also better quality. Yeah.
32:56
What's the standard dose of matcha in the Philippines?
32:59
Is it like 2 grams 3/4? Or should check.
33:03
We usually suggest 1 to 2 grams per serving.
33:07
But for lattes, the standard drink size is for iced lattes
33:12
here in the Philippines is 16 ounce.
33:14
That's like the average size. So for 16 ounce ice matcha, we
33:19
suggest around 5 grams of matcha pound.
33:22
Wow that makes sense. Also for 16 oz is a.
33:25
Lot of volume, well for 12 ounce hot, we also suggest 55, OK.
33:31
That's good. That's what they need to do in
33:33
the states. I mean these people, some of
33:35
these cafes are black dosing like 2G or less for a, for a 16
33:41
ounce beverage. At that point, it's just a
33:43
color. Just the coloring.
33:45
So we're kind of in the matcha hardware business and you do a
33:49
lot of work with cafes. So we'll ask a self indulgent
33:52
question. If there is a piece of matcha
33:54
hardware that you wish existed in the world, what would it be?
33:58
And like, what would its function be?
34:01
This is a wishlist question. We'll make it happen.
34:04
Oh, we should. We'll.
34:04
Try to make it happen. Or of something that will risk
34:08
your matcha consistently that will produce a certain amount of
34:12
microphone, not too much consistently.
34:15
Also a nice addition would be a very mobile matcha grinding
34:19
station or something that we can use to process penta or cafes.
34:24
Because for the current setup of cafes in the Philippines and in
34:28
most parts of the world, they have coffee grinders.
34:31
It's like a must have part of your cafe bar, your coffee shop.
34:38
You cannot operate without a coffee grinder.
34:40
So by putting something like a grinder in the cafe set up, it
34:46
will change things a lot. It's like having fresh ground
34:49
matcha is much more game changing than using matcha that
34:53
was ground weeks ago or even months ago.
34:56
It will bring out a different experience for cafe grow goers,
35:00
cafe hoppers. That's for sure.
35:01
We're working on that. Hopefully that future is sooner
35:05
than we all think. But for auto whisker, do you see
35:09
that you know, looking more similar to a traditional chassen
35:13
or you know, retain the structure or do you think that,
35:16
you know a more innovative mechanism will be OK?
35:20
Not really limiting with the manual risking that will be
35:23
automated, but anything that would make the work easier will
35:27
be accepted by cafes. OK, because for some cafes
35:31
convenience is key. They like to do things fast, as
35:34
convenient as possible with as little work as possible.
35:39
The biggest coffee I partner with here in the Philippines
35:42
that produces like 300 to 500 cups of matcha a day.
35:48
Wow, wow. That's a lot.
35:50
Wow, that's. Really with a dose with a dose
35:53
of 5g per drink. Wow wow, they moved through a
35:57
lot of matcha. Wow those are some crazy
36:01
volumes. Wait 300 cups a day at 5 grams.
36:06
On a slow day, 500 cups on a good day.
36:08
So let's say on average 400 * 5 two kilos a day.
36:13
Wow. Yeah.
36:14
That's just for the drinks. They also have pastries,
36:17
self-serve, and cookies that are much separate.
36:21
Wow, so maybe I. So in average they use like 3
36:24
kilos a day. Wow that's insane.
36:26
That's almost they use over a metric ton of matcha a year.
36:30
No, like seven metric tons of much a year.
36:34
Am I doing my math wrong? Yeah, it times 330.
36:37
No, because it's 100. It's 100 KG a month.
36:40
A little over. Yeah, you're right.
36:42
You're right. Almost one metric ton.
36:44
Yeah. Wow.
36:45
That's. That's great.
36:47
I heard of some cafes in London recently doing I think it was
36:51
between 5:00 to 10:00 KG a month but up to 10 or 12 and I thought
36:56
wow that's a lot but compared. To 5 to 10.
36:59
Compared to, that's nothing. Yeah, 5 to 10 KG is like the
37:03
average volume of cafes here in the Philippines per month.
37:06
Per month. Yeah, 5 to 10.
37:08
KG Wow. Wait, these are gigantic
37:10
volumes, but this is not like a small part of the sales.
37:14
Yeah, yeah, like. Here in my province, personally
37:17
in my shop we use around 1:00 to 3:00.
37:19
One to two kilos only per month and from some the other
37:24
neighboring shops that I supply much at, we're in our province,
37:27
the largest consumption is like 3 kilos a month, but for the
37:32
metro and other provinces that the demand is too high.
37:36
Wow, well, this is that those volumes are crazy.
37:39
That was not what I would have guessed.
37:41
That's that's like next level our.
37:44
Current rate of importation When I started this business like 3
37:50
years ago, I import only around 20 kilos to 20 kilos monthly.
37:55
When I launched No Bad Matcha this January this year, we
38:00
skyrocketed to 50 kilos monthly. But now, almost halfway through
38:06
the year, we're doing 200 kilos a month.
38:09
Wow. You guys are a major importer.
38:12
Pronential, yeah. Yeah, kind of growth.
38:15
That's crazy. Yeah, Congrats.
38:17
Is it that's we're actually avoiding social media ads from
38:21
the start? We haven't launched any social
38:23
media sponsored ad because we cannot just keep up with the
38:26
demand. The struggle that I see for
38:29
someone like us, someone importing matcha that has good
38:33
quality, the big coffee part, actors are actually gatekeeping
38:37
us. They are not accepting A
38:39
collaboration post or they're not helping out our company in
38:44
any way to boost our social media following.
38:48
And from their point of view, they told me that they are
38:51
avoiding competitors with the supply and also they're telling
38:55
that some coffee around us are copying their suppliers, typing
39:00
suppliers from them, which are they are trying to avoid
39:04
actively. Interesting.
39:05
Yeah, interesting. Well, that's crazy.
39:07
Congratulations. Like that is some insane growth.
39:11
Like this is really having a huge impact.
39:13
And you know, this is like exactly what needs to happen
39:17
from like that Japanese farmers perspective who said that he's
39:20
afraid that the world is only going to be tasting fake matcha.
39:24
Like this is like the actual hard work that needs to get done
39:28
every day across all these businesses and all the consumers
39:32
that that serves. Because if you think about like
39:35
your business and then your account and then your consumers,
39:38
it's incredible leverage getting a great product that's actually
39:42
real matcha in all of these hands and all of these cafes.
39:45
I mean, it's probably 10s of thousands of consumers and like
39:48
that's only going to be growing. So that's that like thank you.
39:52
So that's really incredible. And like it really needs to
39:55
happen so that people can taste real matcha.
39:57
It's only with like companies like yours that that's ever
40:00
going to happen and like giving people the knowledge and the
40:03
supply to create a great experience.
40:06
And what we do on our part is we also have big our partner cafes,
40:11
if they cannot give justice to the matcha that we are serving,
40:15
we are supplying them. We are actually pulling out our
40:18
matcha from them. So we had like 2 cafes that we
40:22
pulled out from just because they are not storing the matcha
40:25
properly, serving it properly. Whoa.
40:28
Oh, you like, will stop supplying them?
40:30
Yeah, yeah. Whoa.
40:32
Wow. That's great too.
40:34
Wow, that's next level dedication.
40:36
Yeah. Wow, that's.
40:37
Just my training there we do random research.
40:41
Wow, that's that's serious. That's great.
40:44
I. Thought seriously, that's next
40:47
level. You're setting up like a new
40:49
industry standard basically, which is awesome.
40:52
Wow, I love that. Yeah, never heard of that.
40:54
That's crazy about it. Philippines is relatively small
40:58
to do that possibly, but for countries with larger regions
41:04
it's like that would be very hard to do.
41:06
That's true. That's true.
41:08
Then they can just easily switch to a different supplier.
41:11
Yeah, that's very cool. Yeah, that's very cool.
41:14
That's very inspiring. You only heard of this kind of
41:18
story in like electronics, these high tech supply chains, but not
41:23
necessarily in sort of beverage, which is awesome.
41:25
And you don't hear about that very often at all, like
41:29
sacrificing business because someone's not doing the product
41:32
justice. Also after since it's like the
41:37
main selling point of low but. Actually, yes, publish some kind
41:41
of label like these coffee shops are supplied by know that much
41:47
like this is really you guys are really making a quality
41:49
statement. Yeah, yeah, yeah.
41:51
Only with their consent. Like I said, the bigger coffee
41:54
shops are doing 10 kilos, 20 kilos monthly.
41:57
They are not really willing to be part of our marketing.
42:02
Yeah, so bittersweet, I guess. Yeah, yeah.
42:05
Literally bittersweet. That's great.
42:09
So James, what's your future growth plan in the Philippines?
42:12
Do you expect to expand beyond the country?
42:15
And also along the way have you find any like like minded people
42:19
that's willing to fight the battle with you?
42:21
For now or no bad match, we are aiming to focus solely in the
42:26
Philippines and recently in my workshops, the ones that I
42:32
conduct here in my Cafe and on other cafes, we are actually
42:36
producing like minded people that are helping us in importing
42:41
good match and distributing it to other people.
42:44
We don't mind at all if they become competitors in the future
42:48
because for us we are still at the at our current situation for
42:52
matcha. We need more middle men, we need
42:55
more importers, we need more distributors for cafes to be
43:00
flooded with real matcha and eliminate the use of fake
43:03
matcha. So for no bad matcha, we produce
43:07
like less than 50 students only, but some of them like one out of
43:12
10 has been gaining popularity when it comes to matcha, from
43:18
making their own cafes to being there, being a distributor for
43:23
e-commerce shops like Matcha movements is actually one of my
43:27
the first match of students. Yeah, yeah.
43:29
Small world. OK, awesome.
43:31
Yeah. So like a big part of my
43:34
students, from now on, I see them making their own cafes, my
43:38
centric cafes, matcha pops. And to be a part of their
43:42
journey, part of their growth. It is just an honor for me to
43:46
share the knowledge for good matcha, how to prepare it and
43:51
how to prepare it for the people, for the people to like
43:55
it. Oh.
43:55
I love it. They say.
43:57
That's some of the most like successful restaurants that have
44:00
ever existed. And I I hear this within the
44:02
context of New York City, are the ones that produce the most
44:06
number of alumni that go out and start their own successful
44:09
restaurants. And sounds like a very similar
44:11
mentality. Not not that it's a restaurant,
44:14
but same spirit. You see that in the cocktail bar
44:17
scene. All these bartenders, they all
44:20
kind of graduated from like a handful of good bars.
44:23
Yeah. And the current situation of my
44:25
China in the Philippines, I don't compete for clients.
44:28
It's the other way, other way around.
44:30
The clients compete for my stocks.
44:33
The demand is just too high for competition to actually exist.
44:37
That's great at least. That's especially great because
44:41
then you can demand quality because, yeah, and maybe that's
44:44
like over aligning of the market shortage.
44:46
Like if it's difficult to find a supplier, you can be like, yeah,
44:50
I'm happy to supply you, but we got to do some staff training.
44:54
We're gonna make sure that you're preparing it right and
44:57
really make sure the quality standards are there.
44:59
Yeah, a lot. Of then it's not a race to the
45:01
bottom. I love it.
45:03
That's awesome. It's very energizing.
45:05
Yeah, because we've had a lot of conversations recently with the,
45:08
like other side, like on the the Japanese tea farming side and,
45:12
and people that like have recently visited Origins talking
45:16
about how terrified all these matcha farmers are.
45:20
And like, this is like an exact solution to that problem.
45:23
Yeah. Yeah, I hope we can bring the
45:25
words to the other side too, Ryan.
45:28
Yeah. Both words needs to know each
45:30
other's existence. I feel like it's quite
45:33
energizing. Yeah.
45:34
Very helpful, very hopeful. Yeah, actually the people my
45:40
partners with is also very conscious with how we use their
45:44
match. They always take like James,
45:46
take good care of our match. If a customer is rejecting the
45:50
match, do not throw it away. Send it back to me and I will
45:53
replace it. Wow wow, that's like next level
45:57
commitment on their side too. Yeah.
46:00
And we haven't experienced any dissatisfied customers like
46:04
everyone is giving good feedback.
46:06
That's a good sign. It's.
46:08
Incredible. Yeah, it's awesome.
46:11
I guess we need to travel down I.
46:12
Think it's a great place to. Taste all the results.
46:15
Also my advice for new distributors, new people that
46:19
are coming in to the matcha market, I would advise that they
46:23
would try to focus in promoting matcha 2 cafes that are not
46:28
using real matcha so they do not have to snipe other cafes that
46:33
are already using real matcha. Because competing and comparing
46:38
2 matchas is very hard and will oftentimes the cafe will still
46:43
choose what they are currently using instead of choosing you.
46:47
So to get an easy sale, it's better to promote to someone not
46:52
choosing real much. You can do a side by side
46:54
comparison and immediately get the sale.
46:58
Yeah, a lower hanging fruit. Yeah.
47:01
Yeah, that's a really important sort of battle to be won, so to
47:06
speak. Yeah, for everyone and for our
47:08
industries. Yeah.
47:09
Thank you. Yeah.
47:11
Well, I think that's a great place to end.
47:12
And thank you so much, James, for coming on.
47:15
And thank you to all the listeners.
47:17
If you enjoyed this episode, please consider sharing with a
47:20
friend and give no bad matcha a follow.
47:23
And we'll see you on the next one.
47:24
Thanks. Yep, thank you.
47:25
Thanks. A good matcha.
47:26
Thank you. Bye.
47:28
Bye. Don't drink bad matcha.