State-owned (COFCO / China Tea) oolong blender and exporter in Xiamen, owner of the 海堤 (Haidi, 'Haiti') brand from 1960 and of the 1974 letter codes for export oolong.
Two separate COFCO/China Tea subsidiaries exist. 厦门茶叶进出口有限公司 (Xiamen, founded 1954) owns 海堤 (registered 1960). 福建茶叶进出口有限责任公司 (Fuzhou, founded February 1950) owns 蝴蝶 (Butterfly, registered 1961) and FT. The two are easily confused because both are China Tea oolong exporters in Fujian. In the MOFCOM and China Tea records 海堤 belongs only to the Xiamen company.
MOFCOM gives the brand's creation as 1954 (the company's founding) but dates the 海堤 trademark registration to 1960. COFCO (2011) gives both: founded 1954, trademark 1960, and '57 years' of history. The 'lineage' on the MOFCOM page runs from the 19th-century 林金泰 tea house through pre-1956 private firms. It is a company-written account of craft lineage, not corporate continuity.
MOFCOM gives the 1954 parent name as 中国茶业公司福建分公司厦门办事处, using 茶业. The alternative spelling 茶叶 and the precise founding date remain unconfirmed.
Founded in 1954 as the Xiamen office of the China Tea Company's Fujian branch. In 1956 the joint state-private Xiamen tea export company was merged in, and the office became the Xiamen sub-branch (厦门支公司). A tea packing factory opened in 1958. The 海堤 trademark was registered in 1960, later also in the US, UK, Canada, Australia, Japan, Thailand, Hong Kong and Macau. It is named after the Xiamen causeway that linked the island to the mainland. In 1958 and 1974 the company introduced coal- and then electric-powered roasting in place of charcoal. It credits its house style to blending and heavy roasting (精拼配和高火功).
In 1974 it introduced the letter codes for export oolong (K = Tieguanyin, S = Sezhong, L = oolong, etc.), still used in trade. It opened the Japanese oolong market in 1976 and, according to MOFCOM, backed Ito En's first canned oolong drink in 1980. A new export tea factory opened in 1987. Today it is a subsidiary of 中国茶叶股份有限公司 (China Tea Co., Ltd., part of COFCO). It trades as 中茶厦门, focuses on oolong and black tea, and is based at 厦门市湖滨中路160号. 海堤 became a 中华老字号 (China Time-honoured Brand) on 26 January 2011 and a 福建老字号 on 5 April 2022.
MOFCOM describes the house method as buying primary (mao) tea from the producing areas, then sorting, blending and roasting it in Xiamen. 海堤 is therefore a Xiamen blender's brand, not a Wuyishan producer's, even for its Wuyi teas.
