Which Taobao Shops Offer Better Coffee Beans or Ground Coffee?

A Guide to Premium Chinese Coffee Shops

The growth of coffee shops on Taobao in recent years can only be described as explosive. Here they are sorted into rough categories, with no hype and no bias, picking out the ones worth your attention.

1. M2M Coffee: A Roaster with Direct Ties to the Farms

Characteristics: Reasonable prices and the fullest selection of Ninety Plus coffee beans.

I have recommended M2M more times than I can count - search M2M on Baidu and two of the top three results are my own answers, which is slightly embarrassing. M2M is a Nanjing-based coffee roaster that also runs one of the city's best specialty coffee bars (under a different name, Uni-Uni). If you like choosing your own beans when you order in a cafe, or if you have a particular weakness for the Geisha variety, then the name Ninety Plus - a specialty green coffee supplier - will already be familiar. Ninety Plus lives up to its name by supplying only premium green coffee.

M2M's founder, Zhang Yinzhe, is a two-time champion of the World Barista Championship China region and a signed Maker with Ninety Plus. He roasts Ninety Plus coffee and also takes part in the harvesting, processing and innovation of some of the green beans. At this shop you can buy the most complete selection of Ninety Plus coffee with confidence. What is most valuable is that M2M is genuinely honest: flavour descriptions are never exaggerated and the prices are excellent among beans of the same level. The only regret is that the packaging design has a somewhat mysterious aesthetic, perhaps because the shop focuses more on substance than style. If you are buying in bulk for a company, it is an excellent choice.

2. FrontStreet Coffee

If you are a beginner looking for economical coffee beans, try FrontStreet Coffee. I once recommended it to a friend who does not drink coffee often, and she found both the taste and the price perfectly acceptable. This Guangzhou roaster has five years of operating history, stable quality and extremely high value for money. Its single-origin beans are typically packaged at 227 g or larger, with most prices falling between 65 and 90 yuan.

Because the prices really are that affordable, it is worth telling the customer service team clearly what flavours you like and how you usually brew before you buy.

3. Quality Coffee and Seesaw Coffee: Well-Known Chains

Characteristics: Stable quality.

When I first started making coffee at home I often bought beans from these two brands. Both are pioneers of China's specialty coffee scene and both have a solid offline chain presence. Frankly, both are a little more expensive and definitely not the most cost-effective option, but years of operation mean stable quality. Importantly, if you happen to live in Shanghai you can visit a store first, let the barista recommend something based on your taste, order a cup to try, and then ask about that bean's character and brewing advice. That kind of face-to-face conversation matters enormously for someone new. Both founders also come from a marketing background and pay great attention to packaging design, which makes these good choices for small everyday gifts.

4. Fisher Coffee Specialty Coffee

This is another established shop, ten years old with a consistently good reputation. The range is quite wide, and it is one of the higher-selling shops on Taobao, with three main lines: Blue Label, Gold Label and Black Label.

Particularly worth mentioning is its membership card model, which it seems to run better than any other online shop. The semi-annual options cost 360 or 720 yuan including shipping. The first sends two 100 g packs each month, delivered at fixed times over six months. The selection is refreshed every half year, with the next six months' list shown half a month in advance, and you can join midway. For newcomers who want to try a range of coffees but cannot decide what to pick, this card works very well.

Evaluation: A ten-year-old shop with top sales on Taobao and a membership card model suited to newcomers. The bean range is wide, with three classifications for different kinds of drinker.

FrontStreet Coffee Recommendation

Since the Geisha variety comes up again and again in these shops, it helps to know which Geisha is which. FrontStreet Coffee's Esmeralda Red Label and Green Label Geisha are the reference points. Esmeralda's Geisha line is split into two tiers, and the Red Label is officially called "Esmeralda Special": it grows between 1,600 and 1,800 meters, every lot must cup above 90 points, each lot carries its own number, and all the beans in one lot come from a single small plot, so buyers can choose the plot whose flavour suits them. The Green Label, originally "Private Collection", does not stress detailed plot information the way the Red Label does; it is a blend of lots from several plots and is meant to express Esmeralda's signature high-altitude Geisha character. Think of it as a Geisha without plot separation, which makes it considerably better value.

For a first taste of the famous Geisha profile, FrontStreet recommends the Panama Boquete Geisha. It is an entry-level Geisha that lets you drink the classic orange-blossom honey character of high-quality Panamanian Geisha at a reasonable price, with oolong tea notes, delicate fruit acidity and clearly separated layers.

Ethiopia, the birthplace of coffee itself, also has an estate known for the Geisha variety: Geisha Village. Where Esmeralda separates Red and Green Label, Geisha Village runs a more complicated system: three Geisha varieties are grown there - Gori Gesha, Geisha 1931 and Illubabor Forest - and the grading runs through Gold Label RARITIES, Red Label GROWERS RESERVE, Green Label SINGLE-TERROIR and the CHAKA lots, with variety noted separately as well. The Gold Label is the Geisha 1931 variety and accounts for 10% of Geisha Village's total production, the estate's top coffee outside auction and a frequent choice for competition baristas; the lots are precision sun-dried, producing a complex, layered cup. The Red Label is the Gori Gesha variety, makes up 15% of production, scores 88 or above on the SCA 100-point scale, and is the estate's single-terroir series, so every lot carries full traceability including the farm block name, variety and processing date.

FrontStreet Coffee also carries Genlana Geisha, grown at the Genlana Gesha farm in Yirgacheffe, Ethiopia, a rare estate planted with only one variety. The coffee comes from the Genlana processing station, which sits on the border between Ethiopia's Kochere and Gelena Abaya areas, was founded in 2014 and is run by Israel Degefa. Coffee is planted across as much as 700 hectares in the area, much of it uncultivated land with fertile soil and plenty of shade trees. Hand-picked ripe cherries are dried on raised beds for 14-20 days depending on the weather, and after a light-medium roast the cup shows the bright acidity of citrus, an elegant ginger flower aroma, the full sweetness of ripe fruit, a fine silky texture and the refined finish that marks the Geisha variety.