By Dan Bolton
Japan's second-largest tea exporter and Germany's Wollenhaupt Tee announce a large volume, cold-chain distribution hub based in Hamburg.
Maruyama Tea Products Corp., based in Kakegawa in Shizuoka prefecture, is a family-owned and managed tea supplier since 1933. Wollenhaupt, based in Hamburg and founded in 1881, is also family-owned. The company stocks, blends, flavors, and packages tea for export to 70 countries.
Marco Sinram, Wollenhaupt’s head of tea trading, writes that “Wollenhaupt and Maruyama not only shared a similar ownership structure and philosophy in management style, but they have found in each other stable and reliable partners. Since 2018 they have entered ever-closer cooperation to focus on promoting Japanese teas to the western markets.”
Wollenhaupt imports Japanese teas exclusively from Maruyama part of a wide selection of teas warehoused in Hamburg for delivery on short notice.
Sinram explained that Maruyama is equipped to nitrogen flush and vacuum pack tea in large shipments that arrive every eight weeks. On arrival Wollenhaupt refrigerates teas at a constant temperature below 8°C. Container lots and a regular shipping schedule lowers costs, and "stock never stays too long. This ensures absolute fresh quality to the customer,” writes Sinram.
Matcha is a mainstay. The tencha is ground only when it needs to be packed against an order. Until then, it remains as the raw material, "tencha," said Sinram. "This tencha is stored at up to minus 20°C," he said. The company also has developed “Tokuni – a range of three 100% Japanese teas gently and naturally flavored which are positioned between classical teas and flavored blends," he writes. Learn more at www.wollenhaupt.com.