Latest / Specialty Matcha Podcast / Kissatens, Blue Bottle, and Specialty Matcha

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Kissatens, Blue Bottle, and Specialty Matcha · Specialty Matcha Podcast

0:00
Hello and welcome to the Specialty Match Podcast.
0:02
My name is Ryan, this is my Co host Zhangjun.
0:04
Hello, hello. And we're the Co founders of
0:06
Sanko Match Products. Yeah, we launched this podcast
0:09
to discuss our learning journey, Matcha, share startup stories
0:11
and interview experts. And today we're going to share
0:15
you a very interesting experience that we just had in
0:17
Tokyo, visiting some coffee shops.
0:20
And one of these coffee shops was really original inspiration
0:24
of the birth of Blue Bottle, which is part of the major
0:28
player of modern Catholic movement.
0:29
So we thought it would be fun to visit old school Japanese style
0:33
coffee house called Kisatan, which really like is one of the
0:39
founding inspirations behind the Blue Bottle experience, which
0:43
was extremely novel to people at the time 20 years ago and made
0:48
such a strong impression on people and gave coffee this
0:52
stage and space and created this experience for people that it
0:57
opened their minds to a coffee could be where coffee wasn't
1:00
coffee wasn't coffee. But it created an experience in
1:04
a space where someone could want to appreciate or learn more
1:07
about single cultivar coffee or single origin coffee that's been
1:12
lightly roasted and hear all the different flavor expressions
1:14
based on the way that it's been processed during green
1:18
processing, et cetera, and really helped form the
1:21
foundations of what became the specialty coffee movement.
1:24
So we think that there's actually a lot of lessons to be
1:27
learned here between these different cultural exchanges
1:30
that happened in the early days of coffee to build the specialty
1:33
coffee industry that are highly applicable to the matcha
1:37
industry today. Yeah.
1:38
So we thought that it would be a great opportunity to utilize
1:43
such almost a pilgrimage to follow the past path of James
1:48
Freeman, who is the founder of Blue Bottle.
1:51
And we started from this place called Chatehatto.
1:55
It's a quisetan in Shibuya and it's a really the first time
2:00
that James Freeman in a lot of his interview talked about that.
2:03
He really got inspired. Yeah, and just give you a sense
2:07
of some of his stories. And I, I really urge everyone to
2:10
go listen to some of his early talks.
2:12
He gave one, I think at Stanford.
2:14
He gave one at Google, really interesting talks about the the
2:17
founding story of Blue Bottle. But anyway, he he walked in and
2:21
he sat down at the bar and there's this gigantic wall of
2:24
cups and these are all European style cups.
2:27
He said 10s of in general have a very European feel.
2:30
We'll kind of describe what our experience was like walking in
2:33
in a second. But the coffee person took his
2:37
order. He turned around and he looked
2:40
at this giant wall of cups and as if he was trying to select
2:44
the right cup for the right person at the right moment for
2:47
the order that they got. And they thought about it and
2:49
they picked one off the wall for him.
2:52
He preheated, even preheated the saucer.
2:55
He made the coffee by hand to order and then presented to him
2:59
with such care. And this is the level of care
3:01
that you would see in something like Chana Yu.
3:04
And like a tea ceremony where there's economy of movement,
3:07
where there's consideration for a unique thing for a guest.
3:11
But when you host a tea ceremony, you often choose tea
3:13
Ware or flowers that are reflective of the season.
3:16
And even depending on different people, you can select specific
3:19
chowans or tea bowls just for that.
3:22
It can be highly customized experience.
3:25
It's a really a good reflection of Ichiko Ichi like to create a
3:29
very unique moment for you to experience and to remember.
3:33
Yeah, And all these implicit indicators saying I see you care
3:38
about you in crafting an experience for you, which is
3:42
just in the next level of hospitality.
3:44
And this is not just true in tea ceremony or in kisa tans.
3:48
It's all throughout Japanese culture in Japan, at the very
3:52
nice restaurants, at the very nice bars, at the hotels.
3:56
It's just this level of implicit message.
3:59
I see you, I, I'm taking care of you.
4:02
I care about your experience in a way that's not flashy or Foo
4:06
Foo. And you really, it'd be easy to
4:09
skim over this and not even notice.
4:12
But when you really look carefully, there's so much
4:15
consideration for every little detail that crafts an
4:18
experience. And this is really what he took
4:20
away and was able to present coffee in a very different way.
4:25
I mean, to create the space for dialogue and to create interest
4:28
and almost a curiosity gap when people would walk into these
4:32
early Blue Bottle cafes. But anyway, preheats the saucer,
4:36
hands him the cup, has him enjoy it.
4:38
And there's other good, there's other good pastries and sweets
4:43
there as well. And this was such a formative
4:45
memory for him that he kind of took a lot of the style and
4:48
level of intentionality and did things like do the emotional
4:53
mapping journey of Cafe design. Where are the anxiety points?
4:58
How are things supposed to be clean?
5:00
How do we justify everything that's there?
5:03
It's not quite minimalism. And when people say that he's
5:07
minimalistic and it's a minimalistic aesthetic, he says.
5:10
I don't know really about that because it's not minimalism for
5:13
the sake of minimalism. Everything that you see just has
5:16
to be rationalized. The really the the original idea
5:20
of less is more, right? Like it's not really about less,
5:23
it's really about how can you experience more from the less.
5:28
From from what is there, which I mean, which is very different
5:33
than Kisa 10, but the similar level of intentionality was
5:36
brought to this type of aesthetic.
5:38
And then he thinks that the sensory experience of entering a
5:40
cafe doesn't start with your first sip of coffee.
5:43
It's such as the door handle the first thing that you touch and
5:47
was like all obsessed with this kind of thing, which I find
5:50
deeply inspiring. It's all the things that people
5:52
generally don't notice. But 1000 details, perfectly
5:55
executed, create these next level experiences.
5:59
He's really obsessed with this. He brings it back to the States
6:02
and people love it. And as Blue Bottle begins to
6:04
pick up progress, he also imports Japanese, one of the
6:07
first importers of Japanese coffee equipment.
6:10
So things like gooseneck kettles, those weren't popular
6:13
before Blue Bottle really started popularizing them.
6:16
Interesting. Or the the siphons where they
6:18
have these big halogen lamps in this very scientific looking
6:21
thing. Just out of curiosity, were they
6:23
invented in Japan or? Goose necks?
6:26
That's a good question. I don't know, I assume.
6:29
So because I've only seen legacy brands in Japan that like create
6:35
this source of, you know, equipments that did well and
6:38
really think of anywhere else. I think it's all Japanese
6:41
inspired. Well, they have these large
6:43
enamel tinware ones where the spout starts at the bottom and
6:46
it's like a swan neck. I know there's a long history of
6:49
those companies, but I don't know where it was developed.
6:52
I mean, arguably maybe is inspired from like your design
6:56
maybe goes back to China maybe, but for a completely different
6:59
purpose, similar functionality, at least for your design.
7:02
Well, I mean like that's how they use back in the days to
7:05
pour water or. Wine.
7:08
For for for more Thai like powdered tea.
7:10
Yeah, that's true. And there was a boiling vessel
7:13
for tea even before that during the Tang dynasty, so who knows.
7:17
Yeah, who knows. I anyways I would bet it was you
7:21
are inspired and it goes back to Tang dynasty and can be traced
7:24
through China. As with most things in East
7:26
Asian culture, China was the ultimate exporter of culture in
7:30
the early days. At the time, yeah.
7:33
So, but anyway, when they opened their cafe in Nick Plaza in
7:38
downtown San Francisco and they had all these halogen lamp
7:41
setups and these Kyoto style ice strips, they had this very new
7:45
looking aesthetic. And we're presenting coffee in
7:47
just such an interesting way for people with a level of
7:51
hospitality that probably people were not used to with probably
7:55
both with largely implicit messaging.
7:57
A big thing he talks about is not really talking about the
8:00
brand. The interesting thing, a lot of
8:02
these key set 10s, you don't necessarily see gigantic signs
8:05
or on lights. And he was like, I really
8:08
dislike this idea of a big logo saying blue bottle.
8:12
Everything is meant to be very small, very subtle, and he
8:17
didn't like it when brands shoved brand messaging down
8:21
someone's throat. And not to punch too much on
8:24
other matcha companies, but this is a personal frustration of
8:27
mine when people are like this match has authentic, it's rare.
8:31
Everything else you're drinking is crap.
8:33
This is the real stuff. It's like same level of explicit
8:38
in your face messaging and it's so top down.
8:40
I can't stand it. Which is quite irony because if
8:44
you walk in the streets of Tokyo, that's all you see, like
8:47
all these ginormous neon like signage just everywhere.
8:52
It's quite, quite an interesting, like, I guess
8:56
contrast. I bet a lot of people had the
8:58
same frustration here in this country.
8:59
Yeah, well, I mean, all the good places, the good bars, the good
9:03
Kisat tents, they're quite subtle, relatively speaking, so
9:07
you get the mix of contrast even here.
9:09
But anyway, but when the Mint Plaza place opened, it made like
9:12
the front page of the New York Times food section, and it
9:14
really made quite a splash. No one had given coffee this
9:18
type of treatment before, right? I mean, to most people with
9:21
Starbucks and diner coffee and maybe Peet's coffee, but no one
9:25
had made it like the center stage and focus of a specialty
9:29
product. And I got so many people,
9:31
including myself, very interested.
9:33
And so we did this pilgrimage and then we went to a Blue
9:35
Bottle afterwards to make a a comparison.
9:39
Sam Zhongjun, do you want to talk about our experience at the
9:41
Kisa town that that James Freeman was inspired by?
9:45
Well, I'm I'm actually quite curious about his emotional
9:49
journey in the 1st place, but this Kisa Tan, at least for me,
9:54
it feels like it's very similar to a lot of the other Kisa tents
9:59
that I have visited for the, you know, audience and listeners
10:03
that have never been to a Kisa tan in Japan pictured a very old
10:09
and strange looking antique store that only features like
10:13
western style tchotchkes like. Lots of tchotchkes.
10:18
Like, like these are balls. Or like, you know, oil canvas
10:22
paintings. Equestrian.
10:24
Arts, equestrian arts, all of these little gadgets and then
10:28
you have a very big shelf that sits like hundreds of different
10:34
ceramic wares ranging from Chinese to Japanese to European
10:39
Masons style ceramics. And then it's usually like kind
10:45
of dark. I've never been to a.
10:49
Always pretty dark. Always pretty dark and you have
10:52
all these, you know, very old looking wood finish tables and
10:56
and you're inside such a weird forest of old timer things
11:03
that's almost like a time travel or almost like someone's
11:06
imagination or dream of a generic European country.
11:10
Yeah, it feels very Western like, clearly inspired by
11:14
Western coffee cafe culture, which is interesting, right?
11:18
Because these places were places where you could go appreciate
11:21
coffee from all over the world, but it didn't come with the
11:23
baggage that matcha comes from. The more we learn and the more
11:27
time we spend in Japan, the more we realize the tea ceremony
11:30
really has very little to do with matcha.
11:32
Everyone we talked to in the industry, it's just like, it's
11:36
just something completely different.
11:38
You know, it's about as related as like random style St. dancing
11:43
is with ballet. Like these things really, other
11:46
than the fact that it's both dance, they don't share that
11:49
much in common. Like these tea ceremony is just
11:52
so different and it's so unfortunate in some ways when at
11:57
least if you're trying to advocate matcha as a specialty
12:00
product, that tea ceremony is like the first entry point and
12:04
the obvious quote UN quote experts to go to learn about
12:07
matcha, but they don't know very much about matcha.
12:11
They know how to prepare matcha. In their specific way, but
12:15
ceremonial way, it holds back. So then everyone's trying to do
12:19
some version of this because they're the comparative X.
12:22
But for something like coffee, there was other than European
12:25
style cafes, there was nothing. There was no baggage, there was
12:28
no right or wrong way to do anything.
12:31
And it was able to evolve and become its own thing with
12:34
innovative brew techniques like the Kyoto ice strip.
12:37
Things like the nail drip when you're using a cloth sack to
12:40
slowly drip very coarsely ground coffee at relatively low
12:43
temperature produces a very unique profile and they offer
12:46
these coffees from all over the world and are able to present it
12:49
to you in a highly tailored way. It's very interesting.
12:51
I mean, like this is really first entry or exposure for, you
12:56
know, early days Japanese people, but to Western culture,
12:58
essentially it's a it's a lens for them to look through and try
13:02
to, you know, maybe teleport themselves into somewhere else
13:06
that's far away that they have a strong admiration of.
13:10
Japan was really a wonder for the first country to open up to
13:15
the West and industrialize. And this idea of Kisa 10, you
13:19
know, was born along with that industrialization process.
13:24
So you you kind of see a lot of similar ideas elsewhere in Asia
13:29
too, like for example, these they call it part time time.
13:33
For example, if you look into Hong Kong and you see all these,
13:37
they call it tea canteens, which they will serve very interesting
13:41
W influenced food alongside with the milk tea and also coffee and
13:47
you have a very but using local ingredients like Cantonese.
13:51
Separation. Western style interpretation.
13:54
Yeah. So it's almost reverse
13:57
Orientalism like you. Are but things like bread and
14:01
toast, things like scrambled eggs.
14:03
And I remember we were in Hong Kong recently.
14:05
You were telling me there was a very large group of Russian
14:08
people that came over to Hong Kong before the Bolshevik
14:12
Revolution who were supporters of the tsar who was being
14:16
overthrown at the time. And there's this very weird long
14:20
old history of borscht in Hong Kong.
14:23
In Kendall area too, like I was grow up drinking this Porsche.
14:28
We call it Losong Tong. It's really.
14:30
Russian cabbage soup. Russian cabbage soup beaten.
14:33
Cabbage so localized that people think this is a local soup, like
14:37
they grew up drinking it. It's very strange.
14:40
We're it's such an interesting mix of cultures.
14:43
So you have all of that accumulating in a Kisa 10, and
14:47
then you have an American going over having this incredible
14:50
experience with incredible hospitality and intentionality,
14:53
lifting a lot of these things away and moving it to a coffee
14:57
shop that ends up becoming Blue Bottle.
14:59
Back to the West. Back to the West, the pendulum
15:01
swings. Such an interesting.
15:03
Dynamic. Yeah.
15:04
Such an interesting dynamic. And then, you know, people
15:07
evolved on it even further. I mean, you walk into other
15:10
places like La Cabra in New York or places like Black Fox and you
15:14
have all these elements now, especially in New York and a
15:17
bunch of other cities and, and in the Middle East actually of
15:20
Australian own and run cafes that are kind of merging this
15:25
Blue Bottle idea, but with great food programs and kind of this
15:30
special feel like the introduction about 10 years ago,
15:33
a bunch of these Australian owned cafes opened and they're
15:37
really have become some of the best cafes in the city, at least
15:40
in New York, usually marked by having incredibly strong food
15:44
programs using local ingredients, etcetera.
15:47
One of the few places maybe a little earlier than 10 years
15:51
ago, if you went to New York, it was incredibly hard to find a
15:54
place that served both good food and good coffee.
15:57
Those things just did not mix until very pretty recent
16:01
history. Yeah, now you have suited.
16:03
Yeah, now you have suited. Now you have Black Fox and then
16:07
some of the Nordic players came in like a Cabra, but that's not
16:11
a full on food program either. But they have a great pastry
16:13
program. Some of the best cardamom buns
16:16
ever. Wow, you ever in New York?
16:18
Cardamom Buns and the Cabra 10 out of 10.
16:22
Or if you're looking for a very simple bread and sausage and
16:25
scrambled at breakfast, go to suit it.
16:28
Suited has one of the best programs.
16:30
I think it's the best American breakfast I've ever had in my
16:32
life, honestly. I mean, these people are next
16:36
level at Suited. They make their own syrups.
16:38
If you get caramel syrup and a drink and like a mocha, that
16:42
caramel is made in their kitchen, probably with some
16:44
ridiculous butter that they've sourced.
16:47
They're they're like sausage, egg and potato platter.
16:50
They make their own sausage in house.
16:53
This, this Cafe is just next level in the level of care that
16:57
they give their coffee, that they give their tea and they
17:00
give their food program. So this level of intentionality
17:02
keeps evolving across all these different cultures and owners.
17:06
And it's so interesting to experience this contrast.
17:10
So how would you describe Blue Bottle in comparison?
17:14
Right after the key sets? And, well, we moved from the
17:17
18th century to the 21st. Let's first let's talk about the
17:22
coffee in Kisatan. It's very interesting.
17:25
Like it's clearly, I would say the seed of specialty coffee
17:30
movement because they care about the origin.
17:34
They will label all of the coffee by their origin and tell
17:38
you, you know, a little bit about the background story of
17:41
all these coffee beans. And, you know, it's it's almost
17:44
like a a little menu of flavor Atlas of the world.
17:48
Yeah. People can experience and, you
17:50
know, teleport themselves into all these places.
17:52
So I pick a a African coffee and Ryan.
17:59
I was going to do a a aged coffee blend but they said it
18:03
would take 40 to 50 minutes. To make right.
18:06
So I ended up picking one of their standard blends, yeah,
18:09
thinking it was a safe choice. What did you think, Ryan?
18:12
Wow, From a specialty coffee perspective, let's just say it
18:15
wasn't terroir driven by when you roast something to a certain
18:18
point. So you lose a lot of unique
18:20
characteristics about the inherent agricultural product.
18:23
Yeah, these coffee are very, very dark Rose.
18:25
But I mean. Like our coffees did taste
18:27
different from one another. Yeah, probably just because of
18:31
the no stitch level. I mean, like these are like
18:34
very, very high roast coffee. But you know, like they they
18:38
don't necessarily taste bad, but they just taste so different
18:42
from the mainstream coffee preference today actually, you
18:45
know, like a lot of people who grow up with this kind of
18:48
experience will probably think this coffee tastes delicious
18:51
like my parents. So they actually really prefer
18:53
this kind of high roasted, like very caramelized, very strong
18:58
bitter coffee. And we actually, you know,
19:01
recently when we were in Wuji and one of the farmers told us
19:05
that these old lady walking to his tea shop and getting served
19:09
these very delicate Hong SU shaded Wuji tea and being told
19:13
that this is not matcha because it's not bitter.
19:16
Like a lot of people actually grew up with this kind of very
19:19
different preferences that, you know, they, they, they, it's
19:22
just different things, you know, you know, using a modern kind of
19:27
a standard to criticize a of thing from the past sometimes
19:31
can, you know, be unfair. Yeah, so you didn't like the
19:34
coffee? So I didn't like the coffee.
19:36
That's a long way of saying that Blue Bottle coffee is so much
19:40
better. So after we left the Keyset 10,
19:44
we walked over to the Blue bottle in the Moda Sando and we
19:48
got the same coffee which was a Rwanda, I think it's from either
19:52
Rwanda or Burundi. Is a Burundi a natural process
19:55
Burundi coffee. So that means that the coffee
19:57
cherry was fermented off in a dry way so it imparts some
20:02
fruity flavors, often under the coffee seed before it's roasted.
20:07
And then they have siphon set up.
20:09
So they ordered one by siphon and one by their in house blue
20:13
bottle custom made drip dripper. I think it has a name but I
20:18
don't remember what it is. Compared to taste, they actually
20:21
tasted pretty different from the siphon was a much cleaner, more
20:24
acidic cup, and I'd say yours was more complex.
20:27
From the standard drip, yeah, terroir driven, beautiful space.
20:31
We had a little conversation with the barista about what the
20:34
options were and what we ordered, and he asked us what
20:36
our preferences were and it really felt like stepping into
20:39
the 21st century. And we had a very similar level
20:43
of hospitality, I think, but completely different product.
20:48
Yeah, very different. Like to be honest I feel like
20:51
the Blue Bottle service was better.
20:54
Yeah, it might have been a little better.
20:56
And I don't know if this Kisa 10 was having an off day or maybe
20:59
it's become too famous. But I didn't feel taken care of
21:03
when I was there in the level of my expectation.
21:06
And to put this so I don't sound like someone who's like too
21:09
entitled. I've been dreaming about going
21:12
to this this Kisa 10 for 10 years and I've been to Tokyo
21:16
maybe 9 times before and I just never had time and I just never
21:20
ended up going to this key Saturn.
21:22
I've been to a few others and it's been my dream.
21:26
I've heard this whole myth about these cups and about preheating
21:29
the saucer and about this experience.
21:33
And the lady and the person who took our order forgot who
21:39
ordered what. I touched my saucer when she put
21:43
the cup down thinking it's it's going to be preheated.
21:46
This is going to be so cool. I touched it ice cold.
21:49
And they wouldn't let us sit at the bar because we were two
21:52
people, so we couldn't see everything going on.
21:54
So I have no idea if this cup was especially selected for me.
21:58
And in a lot of ways, the inner child in me was very, very, very
22:01
disappointed. And the way that you build up
22:04
expectations in your own mind. But in a lot of ways, it really
22:08
represents Ichigo Ichi a or 1 moment in time, and that
22:12
sometimes we have experiences that are perspective shifting
22:16
for us. And this was clearly where James
22:18
Freeman was at at the time with his experiences.
22:22
And that place with whoever was working there, had a
22:25
transformative, formative moment.
22:28
Yeah, he was. My suspicion is he was probably
22:31
sitting at the bar. He was.
22:34
He was. Yeah.
22:34
So, you know, like because I guess like for people because I
22:38
did end up having similar kind of services in Cafe de Lambra,
22:45
which is another very good KISA 10, very old KISA 10 in Ginza.
22:49
And I was sitting by the counter and I like I felt quite similar
22:55
of a kind of a, you know, service level at that place at
22:59
the time. But that was, you know, before
23:01
COVID, so like late 2019. So it has been a long time.
23:07
But this time we're sitting in a table.
23:11
And as I look around myself, like all the other people
23:15
sitting by the table, there are clearly locals sitting there
23:19
just want to read a newspaper and to, you know, enjoy their
23:22
own time. And it's probably, you know, one
23:25
of the key function of Giza 10, you know, back in the days,
23:28
like, people went there to have a conversation, to read
23:31
newspaper, to read book. And a lot of these, you know,
23:34
writers, novelists, philosophers will go there to, you know,
23:39
bounce off different ideas, talk about, you know, like the
23:42
current politics and all that. Much like the old Viennese
23:44
coffee house in Vienna. Yeah, or like Cafe de Fleur in
23:49
Paris, where all the all of the artists will go.
23:53
So it's, you know, probably my guess is that, you know,
23:58
different parts of the key SAT 10 will probably have different
24:01
functions and will end up having different level of service.
24:05
But that's my guess, yeah. There's not like a quick grab
24:09
and go blue bottle type concept, but I totally see after
24:12
experiencing this, like parts of what he's talking about, not
24:16
only from going to this key Sat 10, but others in just like
24:20
level of care and presentation and creating space.
24:24
Something that he said recently in a podcast was that he
24:27
realized pretty early that the experience of drinking coffee is
24:32
way more than just the liquid that's in the cup.
24:34
I mean, the same thing is true with dining and with many other
24:37
things. Presentation absolutely matters
24:40
and making someone have a feeling and creating a space to
24:43
have an experience. And he was able to do that in
24:46
such an effective way that Blue Bottle became this prolific
24:50
brand. And you know, these places
24:52
created that space. And when I have sat at the bar
24:55
and had that level of service, I could feel it.
24:58
But like Ichigo Ichi, maybe it was a bad day for them.
25:02
Maybe the person who was ordering our coffee was new or
25:05
had a bad day. Like we just don't know.
25:07
There's so many external factors.
25:09
Just like they had no idea that like I've been wanting to eat,
25:12
come here for 10 years and such a disappointment.
25:15
Well, they don't know. They don't know.
25:17
Yeah, exactly. They don't know.
25:19
You know, like this very spirits.
25:22
I'm very happy to see that gets carried on in, you know, all of
25:25
these modern Western cafes and that this idea really is having
25:32
really a new life in a new format.
25:35
And I'm very glad too that, you know, this time the the
25:39
spotlight also shined on coffee. Their intention, actually part
25:44
of their intention was actually making a very delicious cup of
25:47
coffee for, you know, to cater the modern preference.
25:50
Of course. I'm very happy to see that.
25:52
Yeah, absolutely. So what are some things that the
25:56
matcha specialty matcha industry can learn from the evolution and
26:00
presentation of specialty coffee do you think after having these
26:04
experiences? Well, as we keep talking about
26:08
NTCH really did a good job in kind of recreating this new, you
26:13
know, like this new service that you know has been almost
26:18
perfected by the third way coffee movement.
26:21
It's really quite a interesting experience to see how smoothly
26:27
and this idea can be relocated into serving Mata from modern
26:32
audience. Absolutely, totally worked.
26:34
Yeah, Totally, completely worked.
26:37
Just basically lifted so many of these ideas around perfection
26:41
and intention and presentation and creating spaces that weren't
26:45
intimidating and a training staff to have real conversations
26:50
about real preferences and could guide people to the right thing,
26:54
you know, so important. And there's like very different
26:58
levels of menu design in Japan. And what MTCH has done is give
27:02
you just the right amount of information to make a decision
27:05
quickly. And so probably something that
27:07
you'll like. And if you can't, there's
27:09
someone there to talk you through it.
27:11
And they're not like trying to upsell you or upcharge you.
27:14
They're really trying to deliver something that you will enjoy,
27:18
which is a very similar thing that you can experience in all
27:21
these different types of the more traditional types of
27:25
Japanese hospitality. And we actually recently went
27:28
into a very famous, very Instagrammable coffee place in a
27:33
Moto Sando neighborhood in Tokyo.
27:35
And they have a very large menu of coffee and they're actually a
27:40
coffee bean store, but they also will do pour overs and have cold
27:43
brew. And there's this for anyone who
27:46
hasn't been to Japan that's listening.
27:48
There is a lot of places that you can go that are menuless.
27:53
And this also exists in Paris too, at a lot of wine bars.
27:56
I remember walking into a wine bar and there's a very arrogant
27:59
French guy and I was like, can I have the menu?
28:02
I am the menu. I've actually heard that more
28:06
than once, really. And you have a conversation with
28:10
them, and when it goes well, you get exactly what you want.
28:15
And when it goes really, really well, you got exactly what you
28:19
didn't know you wanted. And the skill of that curation
28:23
is very hard. And important.
28:25
Yeah. And it's very hard in a way
28:29
that, you know, like, it's really almost risky.
28:32
Like when it didn't go well, you get punished.
28:36
A thing that you don't like. Yeah.
28:40
And. They don't tell you the price in
28:42
the decision matrix. It's not price transparent.
28:45
So it's really, really trust based system based on a
28:49
dialogue. And you know, a lot of teach
28:50
places are like this too, like a lot of the Tivana retail, like I
28:55
like Tevana as a company in promoting specialty tea, but
28:59
they were high pressure sales. Like those were really sales
29:02
people who were having you smell things, having you taste things,
29:06
trying to push things on you, trying to buy, give you to buy
29:08
more expensive things. If you go through and read some
29:11
of the criticism of Tevana, this is people's biggest problem with
29:15
it and and tea sales in general. So anyway, we walk in and they
29:19
ask us what do you want? And they also asked us, what do
29:24
you like? And these are two extremely
29:26
different questions and they're very difficult to answer when
29:31
you're not prepared. Because if you ask someone what
29:34
do you want, that's like, what do I want right now?
29:37
And I have to collect. Do I give you flavors?
29:39
Do I give you origin and like it's if you don't come in with
29:44
enough knowledge, you're put in a position of less knowledge
29:47
power. So like you're like like
29:49
Folgers, I like Blue Bottle, like you just kind of stuck
29:53
vomiting out information because you have this like pressure and
29:57
even I felt that there. Yeah.
29:59
And it's also really a pressure of uncertainty and unknown
30:03
because like, do you have what I want?
30:06
Like if I spend the next 10 minutes telling something that
30:10
you don't really have, then this conversation is not real.
30:13
I. Don't even know what I want
30:15
right now. What are the options?
30:17
Yeah, what are the options like really?
30:19
You know, like starting from the menu.
30:21
I think would be a much more optimal movement.
30:24
And then what do you like is an equally dangerous question
30:28
because it's different than what I might want right now.
30:31
Even though I don't know what I want right now, I could tell
30:34
you, hey, I generally like things that are fruity.
30:37
I like things that have a lot of complexity.
30:40
I like acidity in my coffee. And, you know, let's say that's
30:42
very true for you, Sam, and it's true for me sometimes.
30:45
But I know, having worked in the coffee industry, that they're
30:49
gonna point me towards a very naturally processed coffee.
30:52
Yeah. But what I want right now is
30:53
something washed that's tea like and floral.
30:56
But maybe I wasn't ready to articulate that yet.
30:59
It's like and floral. That's exactly what happened.
31:01
Probably yes. And then they point to the most
31:04
expensive thing on the menu saying this is for you.
31:07
It's like literally $15 a cup. This whole experience is
31:12
actually, you know, a little bit off putting because you have to
31:15
trust and you might accidentally pigeon hole yourself into
31:18
options. So like I, we, we have a little
31:22
conversation with them and I say I want this and they say this
31:26
one's not available, but this other one tastes very similar
31:30
and you should get it. And it was literally double the
31:33
price. It went from ¥1000 to 2000.
31:36
And I felt like telling her, if it's taste the same and it's
31:40
double the price, why would anyone buy it?
31:44
Like what is the difference between these two products?
31:47
And the moment that she up sold me double the price of coffee is
31:54
the moment that that trust was breached.
31:56
And then the dialogue, it ends as soon as you lose trust with
32:00
someone because they're trying to upsell you on a near menu
32:03
list system, you've breached that level of trust and then you
32:07
just feel pressured. Yeah, yeah.
32:09
And then the, the and then the intentionality really changes.
32:14
Like this is also about intentionality.
32:17
It changed from trying to cater your preference to sell you
32:22
something that you would like to cater your budget, or trying to
32:27
upsell you so that they can squeeze the most out of you.
32:30
Or at least this is how you will feel.
32:33
And this is the problem with top down positioning for matcha
32:37
sales and matcha branding in description, by telling someone
32:40
that they should get something because it's rare or authentic
32:44
or special or traditional or ceremonial grade or super, ultra
32:49
duper ceremonial grade, whatever is a form in a lot of cases when
32:54
it's poorly executed of telling someone what they should want
32:58
and that this is better and it's a reflection on you and your
33:01
taste. If you don't want this, yeah,
33:03
you can get the cheaper stuff, but that's what it really looks
33:07
like and it's not empowering anyone to make a good decision.
33:11
So the top of the mountain is you can have a dialogue with
33:13
someone and give them exactly what they didn't know they
33:17
wanted. Very hard, not scalable.
33:20
Very few people can actually pull that off.
33:22
There's really just one place in the entire world that can
33:25
consistently do this and that I've ever been to in my life.
33:29
And otherwise it's a disappointment because the
33:31
baseline expectation when you're deferring the decision to
33:35
someone else is that you get exactly what you want, which is
33:39
already hard. That's the baseline.
33:41
That's the neutral case versus if you're offloading the
33:44
decision. But if you're making your own
33:46
decision, you want to be empowered to make a better
33:49
decision. And the problem with the way
33:51
labels are and the way much is communicated and marketed,
33:55
you're not given enough information to make a high
33:58
quality decision because you don't know what it is you like,
34:01
you don't know what results and what kind of flavor profile you
34:05
know. It's it's other than price,
34:08
there's not much to go after. Yeah, I mean like.
34:10
Go off of. The people that don't want a
34:14
quality diversity, they want a flavor diversity or they don't
34:18
want a price diversity. So, so to speak, they want to
34:21
try to experience more flavor, more selections that you know,
34:27
presumably within the same level of quality and price range so
34:31
that they can have build up this formative experience, this
34:34
vocabulary to pick a direction to venture into.
34:37
Yeah, so they can make better, higher quality decisions for
34:40
themselves. And you know, that's what macho
34:44
looks like when it's not gate kept.
34:46
The definition of being gate kept is telling consumers what's
34:50
good and what they should like, but the better way to do it is
34:53
to educate consumers on the different flavors available.
34:57
What's out there? What is out there and what is
35:01
there to appreciate? Doesn't mean you can't hold
35:03
their hand and say hey this yame matcha.
35:05
Excellent producer. It has a great example of Hika
35:08
aroma. You might notice things like
35:11
chocolate notes or like roasted walnuts.
35:14
It we're going to blend very well with milk or can go totally
35:18
well on its own and it's a very good choice if you're into that
35:21
kind of profile. Alternatively, for the same
35:23
price, I have this other tea from Uji.
35:26
It's more umami driven. It's very savory, it's very
35:28
green, much more subtle. You mix it with milk, some of
35:32
the intensity might get lost, but if you drink it on its own
35:35
it can be marvelous in the amount of complexity and after
35:39
taste it brings you in a subtle, not in your face way.
35:43
Here are some 2 great options. And they cut they taste the
35:45
same. And Ooji is a much longer
35:47
traditional area. This was done using very
35:50
traditional techniques and farming practices.
35:52
Well, this one in in yame a little more industrial, but it
35:56
doesn't really reflective in the overall flavor profile.
35:59
We don't think it detracts from that in any way.
36:01
Which one would you like? Right, That's a great
36:04
conversation to have. Yeah, right.
36:06
And this one is this cultivar, and this one's this other
36:09
cultivar. They're both first harvest and
36:11
done this year and ground on an Ishiyusu stone.
36:13
Like if you have that kind of description, frequently consumer
36:17
will end up trying both. They actually paid more for a
36:21
better experience, comparative experience.
36:23
I think that's a much fairer kind of approach towards
36:27
consumer because like the intention is to want you to
36:32
learn more, to want you to experience more, to want you to
36:35
enjoy this experience versus in the earlier coffee case, the
36:40
intention that at least what you felt, what I felt is they want
36:44
your money. Yeah, they want your money.
36:47
It's exactly what it feels like when this is done wrong.
36:50
So very painful. And there's a 10,000 different
36:53
ways you can do this. You know, like Zhongjun, this
36:56
one is a Sahi, very old school hultivar, very hard to grow,
36:59
kind of like Pinot noir. And it was honzu shaded, right?
37:02
This one, Oku Midori, usually larger volume, extremely green,
37:06
but it's a little vegetable and it's also a little cheaper.
37:09
So it depends on what you want to use it for and what flavors
37:11
you like and where. This one's more creamy and more
37:14
umami experience. And that's why usually it has
37:16
the price premium. It's more labor, it's harder to
37:18
grow. These types of conversations are
37:20
so important, and then you can value the more expensive thing
37:24
and you can make your own judgments so you don't get
37:26
burned. So anyway, many different types
37:29
of retail experiences can change consumer perception and
37:32
education and what Blue Bottle did to create space and describe
37:35
things in a different way and get people interested in coffee.
37:38
To have these types of conversation with baristas to
37:41
learn about the flavors and the processing is deeply inspiring
37:44
and what many other companies have built on this as well.
37:47
The specialty coffee movement went from a tiny, tiny movement
37:51
in the early 2000s to something that's a $20 billion industry
37:55
today. That's remarkable for like 25
37:58
years run. And hopefully Matcha can do
38:02
something very similar. But we get to stand on the
38:04
shoulders of giants because these cafes are already places
38:07
where people are consuming it. It's just a place where you get
38:10
something hot caffeinated or on caffeinated to drink.
38:15
There's no reason why these any of these companies can't be
38:18
great ambassadors for tea as well.
38:22
That's what people want as well. Yeah.
38:23
And just like, and just the sheer fact that seeing how, you
38:27
know, NTCH is, you know, relocalizing all of these coffee
38:32
practice into matcha and done so smoothly, like there's no way or
38:37
there's no reason why all of these, you know, cafes, coffee
38:41
shops out there can do the same. Like the playbook is already
38:45
established and almost perfected.
38:48
All you need to do is to relocate that and re divert that
38:52
into matcha. Yeah.
38:53
And create, you know, a similar experience for people.
38:57
Yeah, no, absolutely. It can absolutely be done and it
39:01
is being done. And the examples that we've
39:03
seen, I think going into MTCH was that perspective changing
39:08
moment for me thinking, wow, specialty Matcha can absolutely
39:13
have its own future and how well this is being executed and where
39:17
they really have much of for everyone and great educational
39:21
content in a way that is not condescending and really cares
39:25
about the customer. You can feel it when a business
39:29
really cares about the customer versus sucking cash out of them.
39:33
It's a huge difference in the feeling when you like explicitly
39:37
with everything that you're being told and implicitly when
39:40
you read between the lines at these types of places.
39:43
And I think specialty coffee did such a good job of that in the
39:46
United States and in Europe and in other places.
39:49
Explain to people why these products were good and what's
39:53
different and what can be explored and how you could do it
39:55
at home, etcetera, etcetera. So, so much to be learned.
39:59
I'm not sure if there's not an exact coherent thread that we
40:02
can run through all of this, but these are some of our thoughts
40:06
after visiting these places. Experience really to to see, you
40:12
know, like we have been drinking coffee for so many years and now
40:15
we've been drinking matcha for such a long time and we have
40:19
seen this global boon of matcha in many, many places.
40:23
You know, like not just MTCH in Bangkok, but you know like Oyka
40:27
in the United States and even some of the local shops in Japan
40:30
are doing specialty matcha nowadays.
40:32
It's quite a interesting, you know, experience to see how
40:37
these, you know, footprints letting like came from basically
40:41
like the origin of these footprints with such a such a
40:46
interesting way or lengths to deal this whole movement.
40:51
What's interesting too, is that MTCH was inspired by Blue Bottle
40:55
Jeff. When I talked to him, that was
40:57
like one of his biggest inspirations was to create a
41:00
space that specifically didn't look or feel anything like a tea
41:03
house. Anyone knew so they came in with
41:05
no expectations and it was very approachable.
41:08
So the pendulum swings again, taking a Japanese product
41:13
through a Japanese inspired American brand that now is
41:17
existing in Bangkok and also influencing many other people.
41:20
Almost like a silk role for a matcha.
41:23
Pretty interesting the cross cultural transmutations and the
41:27
evolution of the of this stuff and how everyone's kind of
41:31
watching everyone now. It's interesting to see the
41:34
chain of inspiration and how they can completely transform
41:37
industries. Before we know it, there's going
41:41
to be an MTCH style place back in Japan and that's going to be
41:45
something that they've never had before.
41:46
I mean, you have these old traditional tea companies, but,
41:49
you know, good luck learning anything about their products.
41:52
If we go inside sort of suitable for Usucha or Kocha bitter
41:57
sweet. We're talking about very
41:59
different levels. Yeah, very different.
42:02
So very exciting future and very.
42:05
Interesting future. Yeah, very interesting presence.
42:08
Yeah, and tracking this chain of inspiration first hand was a
42:13
cool experience. We recommend anyone do.
42:16
It's not so hard to do this. It takes a plane ticket to go to
42:19
Japan. And one to Bangkok, but it'd be
42:21
a fine round the world trip. Brian, so just an open question
42:25
for maybe both of us. Do you see this pendulum swing
42:30
back to coffee in the future, like from Matcha, from all of
42:34
these new influence and idea coming from serving matcha in a
42:38
contemporary way, Would that impact how coffee or coffee
42:42
shops in the future? So another way of phrasing that
42:45
question I guess would be can Matcha do something that out
42:49
innovates coffee in a way that could swing back to coffee?
42:54
Yeah. In terms of consumer experience,
42:56
I would say. Yeah.
42:58
Like what can coffee learn from contemporary matcha?
43:01
That's a great question. Well, I mean, there's the
43:04
concept of a slow bar versus a fast bar where it's quick grab
43:07
and go or something where you really get a one-on-one
43:10
experience talking to someone where they're specifically
43:12
preparing something for you, like a key sat tan where
43:15
everything is made to order. But that concept has existed in
43:19
coffee for a long time, although it's slowly dying out.
43:22
These slow bars, they used to be really common like 10 years ago.
43:25
A lot of people are getting rid of them because I guess they're
43:29
labor's too expensive and it's not profitable.
43:32
Takes up a lot of real estate. That's where my mind immediately
43:36
goes. As if these slow bars can be re
43:39
popularized and that swings back over to coffee, I think.
43:44
I think that Matcha can also be mixed in some pretty interesting
43:51
and intentional ways to create amazing products.
43:55
And we invited a Korean tea producer and tea ceremony
44:00
practitioner to Penn State about 10 years ago, and he did
44:04
something that was so interesting to me.
44:06
He was using Japanese matcha in sort of the Korean version of
44:10
matcha whisking ceremony. And he put in ginseng powder.
44:13
Really high end Korean ginseng powder completely transformed
44:17
the taste unlike anything I've ever had.
44:20
And there might be some other things, but coffee already has
44:24
an interesting history of being mixed with other things.
44:27
Especially when you go to the Middle East.
44:29
If you ever go to Dubai or Saudi Arabia, the cardamom, cinnamon,
44:34
saffron. I think sometimes they even put
44:36
in a pinch of salt with a date on the side.
44:40
Datefruit. Oh my word.
44:41
Wow, this coffee looks super weird.
44:43
It kind of comes out looking this weird Milky yellow brown.
44:47
The flavor combo is wild. I am like so shocked in a lot of
44:53
ways, but no one is trying to replicate this.
44:56
And like Chai is so common and did not that this really tastes
45:00
like Chai really tastes kind of like its own thing.
45:03
But I'm surprised that the specialty people haven't picked
45:05
up on this and using really high quality like cardamom and
45:08
saffron and other ingredients to make more Arabic style coffee
45:12
would be really cool to see. But I don't know if that's much
45:16
influencing one because there you're actually pulling from the
45:19
earliest parts of coffee culture.
45:21
If you really look at the first adopt, real first adopters of
45:25
coffee were Arab countries and Arabic culture that spread it
45:29
like it didn't get to the Europeans until much, much, much
45:31
later. If you care about doing anything
45:34
quote UN quote, the traditional way of coffee, it's actually
45:37
going back to the start. It was first widely cultivated
45:41
and consumed in like Yemen. Yemeni coffee.
45:45
Discovered in Ethiopia, supposedly, but the first place
45:48
that it was really cultivated en masse at any scale was in Yemen,
45:52
and then influenced Arabic coffee culture, which don't
45:55
exist to this day. So it's not like it's, you know,
45:57
it's not like it's died out. It's just highly regionalized.
46:00
And I'm surprised no one has really helped spread it and
46:03
considering how insanely wildly delicious it is.
46:07
You know, my suspicion is that, you know, for me at least, I
46:11
tried the coffee about 10 years ago and at the time it was
46:16
definitely, AI would say, a quiet taste.
46:19
I like it. I did not like it for the first
46:21
time because cardamom was really not a very popular spice in
46:26
Asia. There's not a lot of spice
46:29
drinks in East Asia. No, not really.
46:31
Not really. And now I like it, but it was
46:35
really like after I have a lot of experience of Middle East
46:39
cuisine that I start to get it. It was just me speaking from
46:43
probably a group of consumers similar to myself, that this
46:48
might not be very appealing to a lot of people in the first
46:52
place. That's an interesting
46:54
perspective. But to me it was love at first
46:56
sip. But I was like, wow, I don't
46:58
know why it was so because to me, I don't know what I grew up
47:02
like. I had spice Chai before these
47:05
spice hot chocolates like this type of thing didn't or like
47:08
even pumpkin spice latte in my really early days, I I liked and
47:13
enjoyed. I think I was a little more
47:16
actually. Weirdly enough, now that I think
47:18
about it, the spirit of a pumpkin spice latte might be the
47:21
closest thing to Arabic style coffee.
47:25
It's very popular. The flavor profile similarity is
47:28
closer than any other example I can think of for Western
47:32
consumed beverages other than maybe Chai, but it's pretty
47:36
different actually. But might actually be a pretty
47:39
big white space where people are primed to really like it and
47:42
enjoy it. Who knows.
47:43
But yeah, no, I don't know. I don't have a very good answer
47:45
to your question. It's really hard to envision
47:48
what that future could look like.
47:50
I mean, the, the modern day matcha is really in it's quite
47:54
an infancy at this stage. It's kind of hard to tell how it
47:58
will evolve in the future and what kind of new ideas you can
48:01
end up creating. But the one thing that I think
48:04
it's very interesting is that it's not just matcha can be
48:08
milled into powder. All the other teas like Ho Chi
48:10
Cha can be milled into powder and it's also very delicious.
48:13
Very good, agreed. Powder in other teas might be a
48:17
natural extension if we can master the technology of milling
48:21
anywhere and everywhere without an ishiyusu or a big large
48:25
granite stone mill, that's just impossible logistically to ship.
48:29
Yeah, I don't know. Future is unknown, but we just
48:32
know at the present that there's something incredibly exciting
48:35
that's being innovative on and we want to see this everywhere
48:39
and that's. And it's hopeful that you know
48:42
that there are group of equally exciting excited people working
48:47
on something similar afterwards, a similar goal.
48:50
And there is a very large consumer group out there that's
48:54
willing to enjoy it with you. I think this is a very, very
48:58
awesome future that we are seeing now, an awesome presence.
49:01
Yeah, it's only a matter of time before because right now the
49:04
most innovative parts about Matcha in the states that have
49:07
any scale are online e-commerce companies doing direct to
49:11
consumer, right. But that will eventually trickle
49:15
down to the cafes and being presented in a radically
49:18
different way that allows people to build preferences and that
49:21
elevates the status of matcha to a specialty product where it's
49:24
not just this random commodity green powder.
49:27
And that's going to have to be consumer driven.
49:30
And so as the technology gets better to mill it fresh or to
49:32
make it easier to prepare and make it more consistent and to
49:36
build a flavor profile, appreciations that afford a
49:39
price premium, then we have a very interesting, exciting
49:42
specialty industry that has gone from almost nothing 10 years
49:46
ago. Now many matcha focus businesses
49:49
and cafes. It's still small, but hopefully
49:52
not for long. All right, I think that's a good
49:55
note to end on. So thank you so much for
49:56
listening. And if you enjoy this, please
49:59
consider sharing it with a friend or giving us five stars
50:01
and we'll see you in the next one.
50:03
See you in the next episode.