Matcha samples for cafes: how to get them before you commit to an order
At a glance
Hisa sells matcha wholesale by the kilo, from 1 kg per tea, stocked in its US warehouse and shipped within the US, with the ship date confirmed when you order. A cafe can order by the kilo straight away or start with 30 g sample bags of the teas it picks, sent as a small paid sample order, and the price sheet comes with the sample order or the first quote. To start, tell Hisa what you serve through the contact form and it suggests teas for the menu. From any supplier, ask for samples of the exact teas you would order, with the lot or harvest written on each bag.
- Ask for samples of the exact teas you would order, enough to make your bestseller on more than one shift, not a retail tin or a single cup.
- Get the lot, or the cultivar, region and harvest on record, written on each sample bag, so the kilo that ships can be checked against it.
- Put your drinks, your milk and your volume in the sample request, and ask about the charge, any credit and the price sheet before you order samples.
- Once a sample passes on your bar, confirm that lot is still in stock and size the first order to your weekly use, not a case minimum.
To get matcha samples for your cafe, ask the supplier for a small sample order of the exact teas you would buy, enough of each to make your drinks on your own bar, with the lot or harvest written on every bag. The lot on the bag is what ties the sample to the kilo that ships later. A sample you can’t trace to a lot tells you which tea you liked, not which tea you will get.
What should matcha samples for a cafe include?
Three things make wholesale matcha samples worth asking for.
The teas you would actually order. Not a retail tin, and not a blend that never appears on the price sheet. Pick two or three teas from the supplier’s wholesale list for the drink you sell most, and ask for those.
Enough to pour on the bar. One cup on the bench settles nothing. Ask for enough of each tea to make your bestseller several times, on more than one shift, with your own milk and recipe. The per-drink dose is in our dose and temperature table.
The lot on the bag. A bag marked “Okumidori, Kagoshima, 2026 first harvest” gives you something to reorder against. A bag marked “latte grade” does not, because the next bag can hold a different tea under the same words. Not every tea has its cultivar, region and harvest on record, so ask which ones this tea has, and keep the bag. How the lot follows the tea from sample to delivery is in how to choose a wholesale matcha supplier.
In Japan, buyers at the Shizuoka tea market inspect the teas before they bargain for any of them. Early in the morning the teas are spread on inspection trays (拝見盆). Buyers look at the leaf, touch it and smell it, then brew the teas they are considering in an inspection bowl (拝見茶碗), every one under the same conditions, and taste the liquor from a spoon. When trading opens they negotiate for the teas they marked, and because each lot differs in quality, each gets its own price. What a cafe can copy is the habit underneath: the sample is the lot, so you order the lot you tasted.
What should you ask about a matcha supplier’s samples?
A sample offer is a set of terms, like the price sheet, and the answers decide what the sample is worth. Ask these before you order any:
- Is there a charge for the samples, and does it come off a first order?
- Can I choose which teas are sampled, or is it a set selection?
- Are the samples the same teas as the wholesale bags on the price sheet?
- Does each bag name its lot, or the cultivar, region and harvest the tea has on record?
- If the sample passes, is that lot still in stock, and for how long?
- Does the price sheet come with the samples?
- What do you need to know about my cafe first?
The last question tells you the most. A supplier who asks about your drinks and your volume before sending anything can match the teas to your menu. Without those answers, the sample is a guess.
What goes in a matcha sample request?
Write the matcha sample request so the supplier can pick teas for your menu instead of guessing. Copy this card into the email or the contact form.
Sample request card
| Field | Value |
|---|---|
| Drinks | The matcha drinks you sell, bestseller first: hot latte, iced latte, straight, other |
| Milk and sweetener | Dairy or which alt milk, and any syrup or fruit the matcha has to carry |
| Volume | Matcha drinks per day, or kilos per month if you know it |
| What you pour now | The tea you use today, and what you want to change: bitterness, color, price or supply |
| Teas to sample | Two or three from the wholesale list, or ask the supplier to choose |
| On each bag | The lot, or the cultivar, region and harvest on record |
| Price sheet | Ask for it with the samples |
Don’t skip the volume line. It tells the supplier which teas make sense for your menu at your scale, and it is the number that sizes the first order later.
What happens after the sample passes?
The path from request to first kilo runs in this order:
- Send the request. The card above, to each supplier you are considering.
- Taste the samples side by side against what you pour now, the way how to evaluate matcha samples sets it up.
- Pour the winner on the bar for a few shifts, in the drinks you actually sell.
- Confirm the lot. Check that the lot you tasted is the lot you will be sent, or ask what replaces it.
- Order the first kilo, sized to your weekly use.
- Check the delivered bag against the sample bag. If the lot differs, taste it again before it reaches the bar.
The first order is still a test, only a bigger one. Work out how much you pour in a week with how much matcha a cafe uses, then buy bulk matcha by the kilo so the first order matches that number and not a case minimum. The rest of what to settle before that order, from minimums to who imports, is in where to buy bulk matcha for a coffee shop.
Where Hisa fits
The sample is where a familiar trade shows up first. A tea you can trace to its lot tends to come with a large first order shipped from abroad, and the easy domestic sample tends to arrive with no lot on the bag.
Hisa sells matcha wholesale by the kilo, from 1 kg per tea. You can order by the kilo straight away, or start with 30 g sample bags of the teas you pick, sent as a small paid sample order, and you get the price sheet with your sample order or your first quote. Stock sits in our US warehouse and ships within the US, and we confirm the ship date when you order.
Tell us what you serve, and we’ll suggest teas for your menu.
Sources
- 取引と流通 — 株式会社静岡茶市場 (Shizuoka Tea Market)
- 茶市場クイズ・用語辞典 — 株式会社静岡茶市場 (Shizuoka Tea Market)