Popular manga café pop-up CinSei is expanding from their two-car-garage-wide space to a full-service location in the heart of Over-the-Rhine.
The café, which serves matcha (a Japanese caffeinated beverage made from green tea leaves) and sells manga (Japanese comics), is the only Black-owned manga café in the United States.
Owners Kendall and Jaleesa Ross have no experience running a store, but the two have had a lifelong passion for manga and anime, and knew there was an untapped market for others in the Cincinnati area who share the same interests.
“We’ve never ran a café before,” Kendall said. “She’s a nurse. I’m a graphic designer. We both have zero barista experience. And on top of that, we don’t go to cafés because we don’t drink coffee. So when we started, we had no idea what to do. But… we knew this was needed in the community, and we wanted to create a third space for people to hang out. The Black community, especially, is extremely underrepresented in this space and is a lot bigger than what people believe it is.”
Their instincts were correct: When they opened last August, hundreds of people showed up, and they even sold out of matcha the first few days they were open.
“We thought people were just gonna come and see the books and leave. But we didn’t expect the matcha to fly,” Jaleesa said. “Not only did we sell out of our matcha quickly, but everyone still seems to love it, and they come back regularly.”
Their lease in the pop-up space at OTR design firm Yard & Co was supposed to end in October 2025, but the outpouring of community support has allowed them to keep the shop open. It’s a bit ironic that the café has become well-known for having some of the best matcha in the Cincinnati area, given that the two initially didn’t like the drink when they first tried it last April.
“At one point, I was like ‘This is disgusting, we’re just gonna have hot chocolate, screw this,'” Jaleesa said. “But once we found a kind [of matcha] we liked, I was like ‘OK, this is gold.’ And we realized Japanese tea obviously pairs really well with manga.”
Two recent additions that will now be menu mainstays are pistachio-infused matcha and hojicha, where a matcha leaf is torched over high heat and gains a natural caramelization (similar to the “roasted” feel of coffee) before a pinch of brown sugar is added to the drink. Kendall said it’s his favorite drink in their shop, and usually what he recommends to coffee drinkers trying to ease their way into the tea-heavy flavor of matcha.
But despite the city’s love for its matcha, CinSei is “a manga shop first and foremost,” Kendall said. Unlike most American comic books, which primarily feature superheroes and are generally marketed toward children, manga is considered an art form in Japan and there are series of every genre—from sci-fi to horror to romance—intended for adults.
Jaleesa hand-picked every single book in the store and has read nearly everything on the shelves. For manga newcomers, she usually recommends action series Kagurabachi (“it’s like Kill Bill mixed with Demon Slayer,” Kendall said) and the high-fantasy series Frieren: Beyond Journey’s End and Vinland Saga, which are comparable to adults-only Western fantasy fare like Game of Thrones.
For experienced manga readers, she usually recommends her favorite series, Fire Punch by Tatsuki Fujimoto, “as long as they’re OK with some messed up stuff,” as the series is well-known for its mature and depressing themes. “I tell them, ‘Hey, just read this, Fujimoto is a genius.’ I can go on and on about him.”
Initially, they planned to open CinSei for three months, but the café’s resounding success has kept it open much longer; eventually, 3CDC approached the two about moving into the former home of Coffia on E 3rd Street in Over-the-Rhine, next to the popular restaurant Wildweed.
Now, Kendall and Jaleesa’s short-term hobby has become a full-time project. Not much will change after moving into the bigger space (“the number one question we get is ‘When are you going to do coffee?’ and the answer is ‘never,'” Kendall said, laughing), but the relocation will allow them to hone in on their true focus: community building.
The name of the café—a play on words combining Cincy and sensei, which is Japanese for teacher—speaks to their goal for the space. The shop is littered with educational information about manga and Japanese culture, and the owners often host events at other venues that they pay out of pocket for and make no profit from, all in the name of growing their local scene.
“Over in Japan, there’s manga cafés everywhere,” Kendall said. “But in the United States, they don’t exist at all. I feel like [this café] is not even necessarily about a dollar for us… this is really for our community.”
Jaleesa agreed, saying the shop is creating “the community [her and Kendall] wished we would’ve had” growing up, and that “we’ve always loved anime and manga, and we always wanted to see a space where you can hang out and find friends who share the same interest.”
Specifically, the two are interested in creating a space where Black people feel welcome, as the larger manga/anime community online tends to be the opposite of inclusive.
“To be frank and honest with you, Black people are usually shunned and looked down upon by anime fans online. Just recently, there was a Black teenage cosplayer who committed suicide because of the harassment and hate they were receiving for dressing up as characters who don’t look like them. For us, this kind of space just doesn’t exist,” Kendall said. “We have customers that are grown adults in their 40s and for the first time, when they come in… they feel seen and welcomed.”
A majority of manga stories revolve around underdogs cast out by society and faced with impossible challenges, which Jaleesa feels is relatable to “how African-Americans feel.”
“I feel like the challenges they go through are similar to how African-Americans live, how America is, and how our society is set up—which is sad to say, but it’s true,” she said. “I feel like it’s easy to connect to and resonate with these underdog characters, and we can see ourselves in them and relate to the strife and difficulty they face when they’re trying to achieve their goals.”
Now that they’re finally able to have a larger space to find the community they’ve been searching for, it feels like a dream come true.
“It’s so funny, I go to work and they’re like ‘What are you still here for? [The café] is your get rich card!’ I tell them this is supposed to be just for fun and then I realize ‘Oh, we’re about to have a whole business,'” Jaleesa said, laughing. “We thought this wasn’t gonna last very long. Now we’re realizing we have a lot of work ahead. But it’s fun work. Like, way fun work… Customers don’t even have to come in and buy a drink or a book. We just want a truly cool space where everyone can enjoy themselves.”