What is your minimum order quantity for wholesale matcha?

Most grades start at 1 kg per SKU, shipped as four 250 g foil packs. Culinary grades start at 5 kg and koicha grades at 500 g because those lots are allocated by harvest. There is no minimum on a first sample kit.

Do you offer private label and OEM matcha?

Yes. We fill 20 g to 1 kg formats under your own label, including tins, stand-up pouches and sachets. Private label runs start at 300 units per SKU and take six to eight weeks from artwork approval.

Which countries do you export matcha to?

We ship worldwide and export regularly to Australia, New Zealand, Southeast Asia, North America, the United Kingdom and the European Union. We can quote EXW Kyoto, FOB Osaka or DDP, and we prepare the export documentation each destination requires.

Wholesale Matcha, Direct from Japan.

Q: Can I request matcha samples before placing a wholesale order?

Yes. Choose up to six grades and we send 20 g of each with the lot data and a suggested dose for your application. Sample kits ship within three business days of a confirmed request.

Q: What is the lead time for a wholesale matcha order?

Stocked grades ship from Kyoto within five business days. Air freight reaches most destinations in five to seven days; sea freight takes three to five weeks. Reserved harvest lots are milled to order and take two to three weeks.

Q: What is the difference between ceremonial and culinary matcha?

Shading time and harvest. Ceremonial grades come from first-flush leaf shaded for twenty days or more, which raises theanine, deepens the colour and removes astringency; they are milled to five to eight microns for drinking straight. Culinary grades use later leaf with five to seven days of shading and a coarser mill, so they hold colour and flavour against sugar, dairy and heat.

Inoue Tea Company holds more than thirty matcha grades — from culinary powder that survives an oven to hand-picked koicha — bought direct from the farmers who grow it.

Request a sample kit See the catalogue

01Who we supply

We buy the leaf. You build the menu.

A tea grower standing among the rows of a shaded tea garden in Japan at harvest time — Harvest, first flush

Inoue Tea Company was founded in 2015 in Yodo, on the southern edge of Kyoto, where the Uji and Kizu rivers meet.

We work with tea farmers in five of Japan's matcha regions and have the leaf processed and stone-milled in each one, rather than shipping everything to a single plant. It costs more. It also means a Kagoshima Saemidori still tastes like Kagoshima Saemidori when it reaches you.

Everything we sell is sold to businesses: cafés, bakeries, beverage manufacturers, private-label brands and distributors. Our largest partner is AU MATCHA, one of Australia's biggest matcha wholesalers.

2015Founded in Kyoto

0Producing regions

0Matcha grades

0Direct from growers

02Catalogue

Twelve of the thirty. The rest are in the trade list.

Grade is decided by one thing: how many days the plants stood under cover before harvest. Longer shade means more theanine, deeper colour and less astringency — and a higher price.

Culinary: 5–7 days shade
Barista: 10–14 days shade
Premium: 16–20 days shade
Ceremonial: 20–25 days shade
Koicha: 25–30+ days shade

Koicha

ITC-K01

Asahi

Single cultivar · Uji Tawara, Kyoto

Shade: 30 days
Mill: 4–6 µm, stone
MOQ: 500 g · allocated

Ceremonial

ITC-C02

Okumidori

Single cultivar · Uji, Kyoto

Shade: 25 days
Mill: 5–8 µm, stone
MOQ: 1 kg

Ceremonial

ITC-C03

Samidori

Single cultivar · Uji, Kyoto

Shade: 24 days
Mill: 5–8 µm, stone
MOQ: 1 kg

Ceremonial

ITC-C04

Saemidori

Single cultivar · Kanoya, Kagoshima

Shade: 22 days
Mill: 6–9 µm, stone
MOQ: 1 kg

Ceremonial

ITC-C05

Yodo Blend

Saemidori · Okumidori · Samidori

Shade: 21 days
Mill: 5–8 µm, stone
MOQ: 1 kg

Premium

ITC-P06

Yame Premium

Yabukita · Okumidori · Yame, Fukuoka

Shade: 18 days
Mill: 6–10 µm, stone
MOQ: 1 kg

Premium

ITC-P07

Nishio Premium

Yabukita · Okumidori · Nishio, Aichi

Shade: 16 days
Mill: 7–10 µm, stone
MOQ: 1 kg

Barista

ITC-B08

Barista 12

Blend · Nishio, Aichi & Kagoshima

Shade: 14 days
Mill: 8–12 µm
MOQ: 2 kg

Cold brew grade matcha powder mounded on black

Barista

ITC-B09

Cold Brew 08

Blend · Shizuoka

Shade: 12 days
Mill: 10–14 µm
MOQ: 2 kg

Culinary

ITC-U10

Culinary 04

Blend · Nishio, Aichi

Shade: 7 days
Mill: 12–18 µm
MOQ: 5 kg

Confectionery grade matcha powder mounded on black

Culinary

ITC-U11

Confection 02

Blend · Shizuoka

Shade: 5 days
Mill: 14–18 µm
MOQ: 5 kg

Culinary

ITC-U12

Organic 01

JAS organic · Kanoya, Kagoshima

Shade: 7 days
Mill: 12–18 µm
MOQ: 5 kg

Trade pricing is issued per lot and per volume. Open an account to see the full list of 30+ grades.

Get the trade list

03Five regions

Processed where it is grown.

We contract with farmers in each region and have the tencha steamed, dried and stone-milled locally. Five supply lines instead of one is harder to run and impossible to fake.

Terraced tea rows on a Uji hillside in Kyoto, catching low afternoon light

Region 01

Uji Kyoto Prefecture

The reference point. Eight hundred years of tencha growing, the deepest umami we buy, and the only region where we take koicha lots. Small volumes, long shade, high prices — and worth it on a tasting menu.

Asahi
Okumidori
Samidori
Koicha

Flat river-plain tea fields at Nishio in Aichi, with a processing building behind the rows

Region 02

Nishio Aichi Prefecture

Japan's industrial heart for matcha, and the reason your culinary line can hold a price. Flat river terrain, mechanised harvest, dependable colour at volume. This is where most of our barista and baking grades begin.

Yabukita
Okumidori
Volume lots

Neat tea rows in Shizuoka backed by tall cedar trees under a clear sky

Region 03

Shizuoka Shizuoka Prefecture

Bright, brisk and clean on the finish. Shizuoka leaf disperses beautifully in cold water, which is why our cold-brew and confectionery grades come from here rather than from the shaded gardens further west.

Yabukita
Cold brew
Confectionery

Dense new growth on tea bushes at Kanoya in Kagoshima, vivid green in early spring

Region 04

Kanoya Kagoshima Prefecture

Volcanic ash soil on the Kasanohara plateau — flat enough that Japan’s first upland irrigation scheme was built here, and mechanised earlier than anywhere else. Warm winters bring the country’s earliest first flush, and the Saemidori off it comes out almost sweet: the most vivid colour in our range, and the grade cafés reach for when the drink has to photograph as well as it tastes.

Saemidori
Yutakamidori
Organic lots

Tea rows in a misted mountain valley at Yame in Fukuoka

Region 05

Yame Fukuoka Prefecture

Mountain mist, wide day-night temperature swings, and a thick-bodied tea that stands up to milk without turning grassy. Our premium latte grade leans on Yame for exactly that reason.

Yabukita
Okumidori
Premium

Twenty days in the dark is the whole difference between a cheap green powder and a matcha you can charge for.

Covered rows before the first flush

04Leaf to powder

Four weeks that decide everything.

Black shade mesh drawn over rows of tea plants before the matcha harvest

01 / Shading Days 1–30

Cover the field

Reed screens or black mesh go over the rows in April. From that day the plant stops making catechin and starts hoarding theanine. We specify the number of days per lot.

A straddle harvester working its way along a row of shaded tea bushes

02 / Harvest Day 30

Pick once

First flush only for premium and above, hand-picked for koicha. Leaf reaches steam within hours — oxidation is the enemy and distance is oxidation.

Close view of thick, dark tea leaves grown under shade, the raw material for tencha

03 / Tencha Same day

Steam, dry, de-vein

Steamed for around twenty seconds, dried without rolling, then stem and vein are separated out. What survives is tencha, and only the leaf flesh goes forward.

Stone-milled matcha powder heaped beside a bamboo whisk

04 / Milling 40 g / hour

Grind slowly

Granite mills turn at roughly thirty revolutions a minute and yield about forty grams an hour. Faster grinding heats the powder and kills the aroma. There is no shortcut here.

05Who buys from us

Four kinds of buyer, four different problems.

Cafés & coffee roasters

You need one grade that survives a milk drink and one that stands alone, both at a cost you can put on a menu board.

Barista 12 · Yame Premium
From 2 kg, restock in 5 days
Dosing and dial-in guide included

Bakeries & confectionery

Colour that holds through the oven and a price that works at 3% of batch weight.

Culinary 04 · Confection 02
From 5 kg, 20 kg cases
Heat and pH stability data

Beverage makers & private label

Consistency across production runs, documentation your QA team will accept, and your name on the tin.

Custom blends to a target spec
Private label from 300 units
Full CoA and spec sheets

Retail & distribution

A range with a story, a margin that survives freight, and stock that arrives when you said it would.

20 g to 1 kg retail formats
Exclusive territory available
Sea or air, EXW / FOB / DDP

06Quality & documentation

Everything your QA team will ask for.

Matcha is a raw agricultural powder sold into food manufacturing. That means paperwork, and we would rather hand it over before you ask.

Every production lot carries a lot number that traces back to the farm, the harvest date and the mill. Certificates of analysis are issued with the shipment and archived for five years.

Paper-wrapped bales of processed tea banded and stacked in a Japanese tea warehouse, each carrying its lot markings

Residue screening

Residual pesticide analysis on every production lot against Japanese, EU and Australian import limits. Reports issued with the shipment.

Heavy metals & radioactivity

Lead, cadmium, arsenic and radiocaesium testing available per lot. Standard on all export orders to the EU and Australia.

Particle & colour spec

Laser diffraction particle size and L*a*b* colour reading per lot, so a repeat order matches the sample you approved.

Packing

Nitrogen-flushed aluminium barrier packs in 250 g, 1 kg and 20 kg. Oxygen ingress is what turns matcha brown, not time.

Cold chain

Held at −5 °C in Kyoto until the day it ships. Unopened and refrigerated, colour holds for twelve months from mill date.

Certification

JAS Organic and EU Organic lots available on request from Kagoshima and Shizuoka. Halal-certified lots on request.

Wholesale partner · Australia aumatcha.com.au

07Partner

“Five regions, one invoice, and the same colour in the cup every quarter. That is the whole reason we buy from Inoue Tea instead of from a broker.”

AU MATCHA — one of Australia’s largest matcha wholesalers

08The gardens

Photographed on the farms we buy from.

Sunrise over the first flush in a Japanese matcha tea garden — Sunrise over the first flush

Walking the rows before harvest in a Japanese matcha tea garden — Walking the rows before harvest

Straddle harvester at work in a Japanese matcha tea garden — Straddle harvester at work

A single new shoot in a Japanese matcha tea garden — A single new shoot

Shade cloth staked at the field edge in a Japanese matcha tea garden — Shade cloth staked at the field edge

Checking growth under cover in a Japanese matcha tea garden — Checking growth under cover

Two hands to draw the cover in a Japanese matcha tea garden — Two hands to draw the cover

Cherry and tea, the same week in a Japanese matcha tea garden — Cherry and tea, the same week

Pulling the shade cloth back in a Japanese matcha tea garden — Pulling the shade cloth back

Cedar windbreak at the boundary in a Japanese matcha tea garden — Cedar windbreak at the boundary

09How to order

From first email to first pallet.

01 / Enquiry

Tell us what you sell

Your format, your volume, your market. We reply within one business day with the grades that actually fit — usually fewer than you expected.

02 / Samples

Taste up to six

20 g of each grade with lot data and a suggested dose for your application. Shipped within three business days. First kit is free within Japan, at cost internationally.

03 / Trade account

Quote and terms

Pricing per grade and volume band, incoterms, payment terms and a reserved harvest allocation if you want one. Account opens on first confirmed order.

04 / Production

Mill, pack, export

Stocked grades leave Kyoto in five business days; milled-to-order lots in two to three weeks. Air 5–7 days, sea 3–5 weeks, documents prepared for your port.

Questions buyers ask first

What is your minimum order quantity?

Most grades start at 1 kg per SKU, shipped as four 250 g foil packs. Culinary grades start at 5 kg because they are milled in larger runs, and koicha grades start at 500 g because those lots are allocated by harvest. There is no minimum on a sample kit.

Can I request samples before ordering?

Yes, and we would rather you did. Choose up to six grades and we send 20 g of each with the lot data and a suggested dose for your application. Sample kits ship within three business days of a confirmed request.

Do you offer private label and OEM?

Yes. We fill 20 g to 1 kg formats under your own label — tins, stand-up pouches and single-serve sachets. Private label runs start at 300 units per SKU and take six to eight weeks from artwork approval, including a printed proof for sign-off.

What is the lead time?

Stocked grades ship from Kyoto within five business days. Milled-to-order and reserved harvest lots take two to three weeks. Air freight reaches most destinations in five to seven days; sea freight takes three to five weeks door to door.

Which countries do you export to?

We ship worldwide and export regularly to Australia, New Zealand, Southeast Asia, North America, the UK and the EU. We quote EXW Kyoto, FOB Osaka or DDP, and prepare the phytosanitary and origin documentation your destination requires.

What is the difference between ceremonial and culinary matcha?

Shading time and harvest, mostly. Ceremonial grades come from first-flush leaf shaded for twenty days or more, which raises theanine, deepens the colour and strips out astringency; they are milled to 5–8 µm for drinking straight. Culinary grades use later leaf with 5–7 days of shading and a coarser mill, so they hold colour and flavour against sugar, dairy and oven heat — and cost roughly a third as much.

Wholesale Matcha, Direct from Japan.

We buy the leaf. You build the menu.

Twelve of the thirty. The rest are in the trade list.

Asahi

Okumidori

Samidori

Saemidori

Yodo Blend

Yame Premium

Nishio Premium

Barista 12

Cold Brew 08

Culinary 04

Confection 02

Organic 01

Processed where it is grown.

Uji Kyoto Prefecture

Nishio Aichi Prefecture

Shizuoka Shizuoka Prefecture

Kanoya Kagoshima Prefecture

Yame Fukuoka Prefecture

Four weeks that decide everything.

Cover the field

Pick once

Steam, dry, de-vein

Grind slowly

Four kinds of buyer, four different problems.

Cafés & coffee roasters

Bakeries & confectionery

Beverage makers & private label

Retail & distribution

Everything your QA team will ask for.

Residue screening

Heavy metals & radioactivity

Particle & colour spec

Packing

Cold chain

Certification

Photographed on the farms we buy from.

From first email to first pallet.

Tell us what you sell

Taste up to six

Quote and terms

Mill, pack, export

Questions buyers ask first

Tell us what you sell.