Matcha wholesale to Latin America: Mexico, Colombia and Chile, and the landed cost nobody quotes

Who is buying

Over the past two months, sample requests from Mexico, Colombia and Chile have become one of the steadiest streams we get. The buyers are small matcha brands selling online and at markets, specialty cafés adding a matcha latte to an espresso menu, and a few distributors looking for a Japanese supply they can show paperwork for. Budgets cluster between $100 and $180 per kilo at our list price, and the first order is almost always one kilo. That last fact is the problem this article is about: at one kilo, freight and tax to Latin America can cost as much as the tea.

Colombia: INVIMA, VUCE and the sample rule

Colombia is the most documented of the three for us, because we ship there regularly. The short version: a courier accepting the parcel does not mean the food can be imported, and a sample is not exempt just because it is small.

• Importer registration. The receiving company needs its tax and importer details in order, and the applicable INVIMA (the food regulator) sanitary notification, permit or registration, which depends on how the product is classified. Matcha used only as an ingredient in a café or food factory may qualify for an exemption, but that has to be confirmed, not assumed.
• VUCE pre-approval. Import approvals run through the single trade window; the broker confirms whether a given shipment needs one before it leaves Japan.
• CIS on arrival. The sanitary inspection certificate issued by INVIMA at the port of entry is a separate document from anything issued in Japan.
• Samples. Non-commercial samples have their own procedure and must be marked 'muestra sin valor comercial, prohibida su venta'. Writing 'sample' on the invoice is not enough, and the declared value cannot simply be zero.
• HS code. 0902.10 for direct packages of 3 kg or less, 0902.20 above that, judged on the inner package, not the carton. The Colombian subheading is confirmed by the broker.
• Retail labels in Spanish: product name, ingredients, net weight, maker and importer, lot, best-by, storage and the sanitary number. Bulk for your own drinks does not need one.

Duty and VAT in Colombia depend on the final classification. On a recent 1 kg courier shipment our forwarder's calculation applied 15 percent duty on the CIF value and 19 percent VAT on CIF plus duty; treat that as an example to check with your broker, not a published rate.

Mexico and Chile

Mexico and Chile both have economic partnership agreements with Japan, which can reduce or remove the duty on Japanese tea when the shipment travels with the right certificate of origin; whether it is worth the paperwork depends on the volume, and your broker will tell you. Mexico's food regulator is COFEPRIS, and retail packs need Spanish labelling under the NOM-051 standard; bulk for café use sits under food-service rules. Chile's sanitary authority (the regional SEREMI de Salud) controls food imports at the point of entry, and Chilean retail labelling, including the front-of-pack warning rules, applies to packs sold to consumers, though pure tea with no added sugar is outside the warning criteria. In all three countries the rule we apply ourselves is the same: confirm the importer, the use (retail, café ingredient or evaluation sample) and the labels before we book the courier.

A worked landed cost

This is the arithmetic that stalls first orders, so here it is in the open. Take Tsuyu, Kagoshima second harvest at $180 / kg, going to Bogotá by courier. The tea is $180. Courier for 1 kg from Osaka is roughly $110 to $140 to South America, so say $120. The CIF value is $300. Using the forwarder's example above, duty at 15 percent is $45 and VAT at 19 percent on $345 is about $66, before brokerage and the forwarder's duty-advance fee. The kilo lands at about $410 to $430, more than double the list price. Now take 5 kg: tea $900, courier about $200, CIF $1,100, duty $165, VAT about $240, landed roughly $1,400 to $1,450, or about $285 per kilo. Same tea, same country, 30 percent cheaper per kilo because the fixed costs are spread.

Illustrative landed cost to Colombia using the forwarder's example rates; your broker confirms the real ones

That is why we tell Latin American buyers to sample at 20 g, then start at 5 kg if they can, and why the standing order model matters more there than anywhere else we ship.

Grades that fit the budget

• Tsuyu, $180 / kg. Kagoshima second harvest, Asatsuyu cultivar, naturally sweet, strong colour. The latte grade for a brand that wants a single-cultivar story at this price.
• Kasumi, $125 / kg. Matcha blend powder from shaded kabusecha; the value latte and smoothie powder.
• Aki, $100 / kg. Yame autumn tencha for baking, ice cream and blended drinks.
• Jun, $275 / kg. Organic, JAS and USDA, for a brand that sells on the certificate.

How we ship there

Courier from Osaka with tracking, five to nine days to the main cities. We can ship DDP through our forwarder's duty-advance service, which pays the duty, VAT and brokerage at destination and bills us, so your receiver is not asked for cash at the door; the amount appears on our invoice before dispatch. Samples: up to six teas at 20 g on the sample form, marked for customs the way each country requires, with the Americas courier estimate shown once you pick the country. For orders over 5 kg we send a one-page quote with price per kilo, courier, the estimated duty and tax, and the document list. Spanish-speaking buyers can write to us in Spanish; we reply in English, and the Spanish wholesale pages cover the basics.

Questions buyers ask