World Tea Expo 2009

World Tea Expo 2009 was held from May 2 to 4 at Mandalay Bay Convention Center in Las Vegas. This year, 228 companies gathered from all over the world, and about 5,000 people had been expected to attend to this show. The first year of the World Tea Expo was 2003, and within 6 years, this show has grown more than 7 times bigger.

This year was our 2nd consecutive year to participate to the show under SA Japanese Green Tea. We really enjoyed to meet some of our customers and to talk with them. For new customers, we explained how Japanese green tea was different from Chinese green tea and especially how our tea was different from other Japanese green teas. Just like other trade shows, I made more that 800 cups of teas as a sample and got many positive feedbacks from customers.

World Tea Championship was also held during the World Tea Expo. And our Genmai cha was selected as 3rd place of blended/flavored green tea category!! I'm very pround that our Genmai cha received such a honor 2 years in a row.

Shincha Season Began

Following to the Temomi Shincha event, Sugimoto Seicha Japan began 2009 Shincha season. Our tea farms are changing its color to bright yellowish green. I'd like to share some photos of our tea fields.

Temomi Shincha is now ready!

An event to make Temomi Shincha was held on April 19th at Sugimoto Seicha Japan. Unlike other years, we invited only 7 experienced Temomi artisans to the event because 2009 Temomi Shincha are sold onto the market. (Last year, about 60 people were invited to the event because the purpose of the event was introducing the Temomi Shincha to the public.)

There were a lot of "specials"for 2009 Temomi Shincha.
First of all, this year's raw leaves came from our own tea field. We usually buy the leaves from our contract farmers.
However from 3 years ago, we started cultivating our own, small tea field and this year's leaves were the first harvest from the field! You may wonder what is so special for our tea field? Tea plants in our tea field are grown in its natural form. Usually tea farmers prune the tea plants to make their production volume large. Unpruned tea plants called "Bara-ki" doesn't have much production volume but has much more sweetness and nutrition.
Second, for a week before the harvest, we covered the tea field by a black cloth just like Gyokuro and Matcha do. By doing so, we cut the sun light off the field, and it allowed tea plants to stock up the natural sweetness.

We started the hand-pick harvest from 8AM with 10 helpers of local tea farmers. The hand-pick harvest continued until 11AM and about 3 kg (6.6 lb.) of raw leaves were gathered. From 10:30AM, Temomi artisans started their preparation and the first step "steaming" took place. After the steaming, hand-kneading started and it continued until 4:30PM. The kneading process was took place on the hot plate called "Hoiro," and wet tea leaves were drying up along with the kneading. At the end, 1.8 kg (4 lb.) of beautiful Temomi Shincha was created by the artisans' hands.

Now the Temomi Shincha is comming to the U.S. by air. Probably we can ship the Temomi Shincha from Seattle within a week!

Touch Leaves!

My brother started working with my father about 10 years ago, and now he is in charge of the production part (mainly roasting and packaging process) of our tea factory. The most important process in the tea production - BLENDING is still my father's job; 10-year experience is not enough to master the secret of blending.

"Touch leaves"

This is the words my father is always saying to my brother. "When farmers bring tea leaves. Before and after the roasing process. Before the packaging. Always touch the leaves. Otherwise, you cannot understand the nature of tea." Following his advise, my brother is now climbing the ladder of Tea Maestro.
Among the hundreds of tea leaves, choose right leaves, decide proportion of each leaves, and blend in the right procedure. These artistic processes bring chemistry to our teas, and it's the only way to supply quality tea leaves to customers.

SFIGF09 & Natural Product Expo 09

It has been a while, but there were two trade shows which my company participated to.

The first one is San Francisco International Gift Fair (SFIGF) held in February at the Moscone Convention Center. It was our second time to participate to the gift show - the first time was Seattle Gift Show 08. Compared to the Seattle's show, SFIGF was huge, and I could meet many buyers from famous companies such as Deans & Deluca.

This time, our sales rep. Xcidia had a booth and our products was a part of their products. I was very pleased that many customers came to the booth and tried our tea. There were many people prefer Sen cha and Hoji cha, but mostly Genmai cha was the top favorite during the show.

The second show was Natural Product Expo 2009 held in March at Anaheim Convention Center. Just like Fancy Food Show in January, Shizuoka-prefecture (the area where our teas come from) had a booth at the show, and my company was selected as one of the two companies helping them at the booth. Because green tea is the most famous agricultural product in Shizuoka, they chose us to intrduce authentic Shizuoka green tea. Another company exhibiting at the booth is Tamaruya, which is very traditional Wasabi company. Combination of green tea and Wasabi received a lot of favorable comments from customers.

Pre-Order Starts!

Now I'm very pleased to announce that we have just started the pre-order of Temomi-cha & Shincha. Since I blogged about Temomi cha last year, I have received many inquiries and purchase requests from my customers, but I couldn't supply the tea for them.
I have discussed with my family (our tea producer) how we can provide the Temomi cha to customers in the U.S. and finally found enough collaborators to produce Temomi cha with us.
Because the production volume of Temomi cha is very low, pre-order is requested for the purchase, but I believe it's worth trying our Temomi cha if you are tea enthusiast.

Also,we will introduce our Shincha to the U.S. customers for the first time. Shincha, "new tea" in Japanese, is the first-harvested tea in spring and the most sought-after green tea. During the wintertime, tea plants absorb and stock nutrients from soil. When the spring arrives, tea plants, full of energy and nutrients, begin to sprout andshow the amazing color of vibrant green.
Shincha is technically equal to Sen cha, which is made of only young tea leaves. But only the ta harvested in early spring is called "Shincha."

Here is our 3 kinds of seasonal offers!

TEMOMI SHINCHA

Ingredient: Young Tea Leaves

Net Weight: 10g (0.35oz.)

Price: $15.00

Order Deadline: April 15, 2009

HASHIRI SHINCHA

Ingredient: Young Tea Leaves

Net Weight: 50g (1.76oz.)

Price: $20.00

Order Deadline: April 20, 2009

HACHIJU HACHIYA SHINCHA

Ingredient: Young Tea Leaves

Net Weight: 100g (3.53oz.)

Price: $20.00

Order Dadline: April 30, 2009

Fancy Food Show 09

This is our first time to participate to the Fancy Food Show. This show is very famous in the food industry, and I've been very interested in the show for a long time. This time, we had a booth under the name of Saitama/Shizuoka Prefecture, which were two prefectures in Japan come to introduce their local industry.

Because of the depression of the global economy, other exhibitors said the number of attendees was less than previous year. However, I believe there were more sophisticated attendees because companies cannot afford to send inconsequential employees now. Person attending the show must have had clear reasons and high motivation to develop their business through this show.

Throughout the show, I made more than 1,000 cups of tea as a free sample, and there were a lot of people showing their interests in our products. I was very pleased to meet many decision-making persons and explain about our teas. Mostly, customers were very interested in our Genmai cha, which won the blended/flavored category of the World Tea Championship 2008. Of course, Sen cha and Hoji cha had received many positive feedback, but I felt a lot of potential of Genmai cha during this show.