What do the numbers actually represent?

What do the numbers 7663, 8603, 8613, 8653, 8633, and 8663 actually represent?

Many people think that only export tea has numbered labels, but that’s not true. Domestic and border trade teas also have these codes, which contain information such as the factory name, year, tea type, grade, and production batch.

The origin of these codes can be traced back to the 1970s, closely related to the history and export demands of puerh tea. To meet the needs of the international market and distinguish between different tea factories, the Yunnan Tea Import & Export Company issued a notification about the “Quality Specifications and Manufacturing Process Requirements for Puerh Tea,” which stated that tea numbers must still be marked on the packaging. In each tea number, the third and fourth digits represent the grade, and the last digit represents the factory. The code for the Kunming Tea Factory is “1”, Menghai Tea Factory is “2”, Xiaguan Tea Factory is “3”, and Puerh Tea Factory is “4”.

Later, in order to standardize the naming system for both domestic and export teas, another notification was issued on the “Reaffirmation of Finished Tea Labeling,” which required all factories to follow these codes, including the factory name, year, tea type, grade, and production batch. The factory name is represented by a Chinese character, and the other information is represented by Arabic numerals.

Originally, these tea codes were a combination of Chinese characters and numbers, but they were later standardized into a 4- to 6-digit numerical system, covering various teas like black tea, Dian Qing (Yunnan green tea), Dian green, compressed tea, floral teas, and specialty teas. This includes Seven Sons cakes produced from the mid-1980s to 1999, which are referred to as “coded Seven Sons cakes.”

In short, the coding system was created to regulate the naming of domestic, border trade, and export puerh teas, using mainly numbers in a system that can also be considered product codes.

Yunnan Tuo Tea (Xiao Fa Tuo) — 7663

In 1973, Xiaguan Tea Factory pioneered the “wo dui fermentation” technique for puerh tea. In 1976, Yunnan Tuo Tea (for export, commonly known as Xiao Fa Tuo) began formal production and was exported to France. This tea was assigned its own export number — 7663. This number not only represented the tea’s identity and grade at that time but also reflected the production conditions of that era.

Decoding the Numbers

• The first two digits represent the year the tea was created or when the formula was developed.

• The third and fourth digits indicate the grade of the raw material (the lower the number, the younger the tea leaves).

• The last digit represents the factory code from the original three state-owned tea factories:

1: Kunming Tea Factory

2: Menghai Tea Factory

3: Xiaguan Tea Factory

Later on, the numbers also included variations for different cake shapes, like 8663 and T8663, where “T” refers to “Tie” (iron in Chinese), indicating a compressed iron cake.

(source:  official page of Xiaguan https://mp.weixin.qq.com/s/8ah4VAM5zN4jq9NtxWIf3g)