An airy cold foam releases a sweet aroma while it coats a green matcha layered overtop a red strawberry puree as senior Savannah Haung prepares a strawberry matcha drink for her customers.
Huang’s matcha business, MatchabySav, offers vanilla, salted maple strawberry cinnamon toast ube and banana bread matcha. Out of these six flavors, strawberry is the most popular. The night before Huang distributes her drinks, she prepares them in her kitchen using recipes from TikTok videos. The mornings after her preparations, she serves the matcha in clear cups labeled with custom MatchabySav stickers which display a photo of her matcha. The preparations of the drinks pay off when Huang sees the reactions of her customers.
“It makes me happy to [see] people enjoy [the matcha],” Huang said, “My favorite part of the business is giving [the matcha] to people and seeing their honest opinions.”
Huang initially started her business because of her love for the taste of matcha. After daily trips to chain stores like Starbucks, the cost of her matcha began adding up. This led her to TikTok for recipes that she could recreate at home for herself and her friends to enjoy. The positive reactions from her friends inspired her to begin selling the drinks to others.
“I didn’t want to spend so much money on a drink if I could make it at home,” Huang said. “[I] like making people happy [that] they don’t have to spend as much money when [my matcha] is just as good.”
The flavors featured on Huang’s menu are promoted on her business’ instagram account, @matchabysav. Each recipe is inspired from TikTok videos before she makes changes to the ratios of the ingredients based on her customers’ feedback.
“[Her matcha] tastes high quality with nice, sweet flavors,”junior Danielle Lopez said.
Huang balances her business with other extracurriculars such as being a Dance Team captain and a part of Associated Student Body. Despite the many responsibilities that she takes on, the quality of her matcha business is not compromised.
“Savannah has a lot of management skills and I feel like it’s really incredible of her because she’s able to [take on] a lot,” customer dance team member sophomore Kate Chen said.
