Japan Matcha Market Updates

Ureshino Tea Prices Nearly Double as Matcha Demand Expands

Oct 23 2026

Ureshino tea prices are drawing attention beyond Japan's domestic tea trade. Saga TV reports that transaction prices for tamaryokucha, a leaf tea identified with Ureshino in Saga Prefecture, reached 1.89 times the previous year's level. For businesses buying wholesale matcha from Japan, the significance is not that matcha itself has doubled in price. It is that expanding demand for matcha is affecting the availability and purchasing costs of other Japanese teas.

The distinction matters. The report's nearly twofold increase concerns tamaryokucha, not a nationwide matcha price index or every tea sold as sencha. Its account connects developments in Ureshino and nearby Yame, showing how producers and merchants are responding to changing demand while trying to preserve established leaf-tea businesses.

Ureshino Tea Prices: What the 1.89 Times Figure Measures

According to the Nishikyushu Tea Distribution Center figures cited by Saga TV, average transaction prices for first-flush tea rose to 1.44 times the previous year's level. Tamaryokucha, a principal tea associated with Ureshino, reached 1.89 times the previous year's level. These are separate figures: the broader first-flush average and the tamaryokucha figure should not be treated as interchangeable.

The report introduces Kazuhisa Tokunaga, representative of Tokunaga Seicha, a Ureshino company that sells tea and also purchases and processes leaves as a wholesaler. He also serves as vice chairman of the Saga Prefecture tea merchants' cooperative. Tokunaga describes production shifting from sencha, tea brewed from leaves in a teapot, toward tencha, the unrolled, dried tea leaves used to make matcha.

For a Japanese matcha wholesale buyer, this is a regional purchasing signal rather than a ready-made adjustment to an import budget. The article does not provide a matcha quotation, an export price, or a US delivery cost. Applying the tamaryokucha increase directly to a matcha contract would go beyond what the report establishes.

Matcha Demand and the Changing Leaf-Tea Balance in Yame

Yame in Fukuoka Prefecture provides another part of the picture. Saga TV reports that the quantity of tencha handled by the city's tea trading center increased by approximately 50% from the previous year. Meanwhile, the volume of leaf teas, including gyokuro, fell by approximately 10%.

The report also identifies growing sales of green-tea beverages and efforts by major beverage manufacturers to secure tea leaves. It connects these developments with reduced leaf-tea availability in the market and higher purchasing prices. The pressure described is therefore not attributed to matcha demand alone.

Yame's Koga Seicha Honpo illustrates the commercial response. Alongside established products such as gyokuro, the company began putting more effort that year into matcha products, including powder and dedicated shakers. The report also features visitors from Thailand and Australia purchasing matcha-related products.

For matcha wholesale purchasing, the useful connection is between product demand and production choices. However, Yame's handling figures are not Ureshino production figures. Keeping the locations and categories separate helps buyers discuss the news with suppliers without turning a regional report into an unsupported claim about all Japanese tea.

Ureshino Tea Purchasing: Compare Quantity, Not Just Pack Price

Tokunaga Seicha's response offers a concrete example of how higher purchasing costs can reach customers without an immediately higher shelf price. In July, the company reduced the contents of some products from 100 grams to 80 grams while leaving their prices unchanged. Saga TV reports that the decision aimed to maintain quality while limiting price increases.

From our purchasing perspective at Matcha Wholesale Japan, this is the detail worth carrying into the next supplier conversation. An unchanged pack price is not enough information to establish an unchanged offer. Ask for the net weight and product specification alongside the quoted price, then compare those details with the previous order. This is a purchasing recommendation drawn from the report, not a claim that our suppliers have made the same change.

For an importer reviewing wholesale matcha from Japan, we would separate the discussion into the product being purchased, the quantity being supplied, and the timing of the order. Ask whether the quotation concerns the same tea and pack weight, what quantity the supplier can confirm, and when that quantity can be supplied. The article does not answer those questions for any particular exporter; it gives buyers a specific reason to ask them before finalizing an inventory plan.

A cafe buying both matcha and loose-leaf tea should also review the two categories separately. The reported tamaryokucha increase supports a conversation about Ureshino leaf-tea costs. It does not establish that a cafe's matcha price, serving cost, or next shipment will change by the same amount.

Ureshino Tencha Production: Planned Capacity Is Not Current Supply

The report describes construction of Ureshino's first tencha processing factory in Fudoyama, Ureshino Town. A former tamaryokucha factory is being rebuilt, with operations scheduled to begin the following spring. The stated annual tencha production capacity is 168.5 metric tons.

That figure needs careful handling in a matcha wholesale discussion. It describes planned annual tencha capacity, not matcha already available for export. The report gives no allocation for US customers, no finished-matcha shipment schedule, and no purchasing terms. Buyers should not count that capacity as confirmed inventory.

The factory's representative, identified as Ikeda, also raises a broader concern: declining tea production itself across Japan's tea-growing regions. He expresses hope that expanding tencha production will help secure farmers' earnings and strengthen production arrangements so they can continue growing tea with confidence.

Tokunaga, meanwhile, emphasizes preserving tamaryokucha and the culture of brewing tea from leaves while developing matcha production. Ureshino's response is therefore not simply a switch from one product to another. The report presents an effort to serve new demand without losing the tea that defines the region.