Starting many years ago, some Macao people like to refresh themselves with a cup of “dark water” (over-extracted black coffee from dark roast beans). Later, consumers demanded a greater diversity of coffee flavours, which gave birth to the “specialty coffee” business. Managing Director of Seng Pan Limited of Macao Jessica Tong,, has witnessed the development of coffee business in the city.

Managing Director Jessica Tong

Macao brand produced in Mainland factory and exporting products to Europe

        Founded in 2006, Seng Pan Limited established a factory of around 10,000 square feet in Macao and mainly targeted the Macao market in the early years. To tackle the restrictions in terms of space and operating costs during business development and seeing the Mainland business that was started some years ago gradually getting on track, Tong decided to move the production line to Jiangmen, a city in the Guangdong-Hong Kong-Macao Greater Bay Area, in a bid to increase the company’s competitiveness. At present, Seng Pan has a factory in Jiangmen occupying around 12 hectares that houses a manufacturing and roasting plant, raw bean warehouse, automated packing line, research and development zone for new coffee products, quality inspection laboratory, and e-commerce department. The factory has been recognised with the Hazard Analysis Critical Control Point (HACCP) certification and the BRC Global Standard for Food Safety and can produce up to 500,000 drip bags of coffee, among other products, on a daily basis. In 2019, the company successfully started exporting its coffee products to Europe.

 Factory in Jiangmen

(photo courtesy of the company)

Coffee bean roasting plant

(photo courtesy of the company)

Raw bean warehouse

(photo courtesy of the company)

Automated packing line

(photo courtesy of the company) 

Product R&D department

(photo courtesy of the company)

Proactively realising the brand philosophy

        Seng Pan’s philosophy is to deliver a cup of premium coffee to everyone under the principle of “Honesty, Quality First”. To this end, the company has spared no effort in strengthening staff’s abilities in coffee tasting and roasting, raw ingredient selection and coffee blend testing. For several consecutive years, their blended Italian coffee products, such as “Dream Chaser”, “French Kiss” and “Aden Blend”, have garnered gold medals in the International Espresso category at the International Coffee Tasting (ICT) competition hosted by Italy’s International Institute of Coffee Tasters (IIAC).

        Moreover, Seng Pan is also committed to cultivating talent for the coffee industry. Besides successfully training its team members to be qualified representatives in the CoE* judging panel, the company has also established a coffee academy in collaboration with the Guangzhou Vocational School of Tourism and Business, which is dedicated to teaching professional knowledge on coffee at the beginner, intermediate and advanced levels and even provides preparation courses for international certification assessments. In recent years, the company has organised a number of coffee competitions, workshops and volunteer activities in Guangdong and Macao through different channels to contribute to society and popularise coffee culture, realising the brand philosophy with concrete actions.

*CoE (Cup of Excellence) is an international competition and auction for raw coffee beans organised by the Alliance for Coffee Excellence (ACE), an international non-profit organisation with an aim of ensuring the sustainable production of coffee and continuous enhancement of coffee quality, as well as improving coffee farmers’ quality of life by encouraging them to produce higher quality coffee.

Three blended coffee products that have won gold medals for several consecutive years

CoE champion coffee beans in 2020

Evaluation at CoE competition (Seng Pan’s barista Chio Song Wai)

(photo courtesy of the company)

Coffee academy in Guangzhou

(photo courtesy of the company)

Expanding customer reach through fairs and expos

        Over the years, Seng Pan has actively participated in many large international events, such as the Macao International Trade and Investment Fair (MIF), Guangdong and Macao Branded Products Fair (GMBPF), and China International Import Expo (CIIE). Tong believes that conferences and exhibitions can help expand customer reach and promote coffee culture, and also hopes that with the development of the Macao coffee business, more professional coffee expos and competitions will be held in the future to introduce more people to coffee.

Father Tong’s Ganpu Cha

Providing coffee and tea for Mainland high-speed rail passengers

(photo courtesy of the company)

Contact Seng Pan

If you are interested in discussing co-operation with the above-mentioned company, please contact the staff of “Macao Ideas” during office hours.

Tel.: 

Ms Cheang +853 8798 9707

Ms Chong +853 8798 9739

Email: 

fionacheang@ipim.gov.mo 

elizachong@ipim.gov.mo