Fresh Cup Magazine, providing specialty coffee and tea professionals with unique insight into the trends, ideas, products and people that shape their world.
Issue link: http://freshcup.epubxp.com/i/105573
J effrey Lorien is at origin for the first time. I'm drinking tea ing about tea production intelligently and with passion. However, with the founder and CEO of Austin, Texas-based Zhi Tea he says, "If you are a small tea shop and you sell maybe 10 pounds in Miaoli, Taiwan, in the midst of his 17-day tour of the a week, it's hardly worth the while" to try to purchase product country. I've known Lorien since 2007 and have heard him talk of during your travels. a desire to visit origins for years now, so it's a joy to sit with him Shiuwen Tai, founder of Floating Leaves Tea in Seattle, agrees here on the other side of the world. that traveling to source tea "might not be ideal for a small busiAs we chat, it becomes clear that not everything on his journey ness" because of the time, energy and money required. However, has gone exactly as expected, especially from a purchasing per- she advises, "Tea is a drink and tea is also a culture. When one spective. "[The trip] shatgets to meet growers and tered the illusion that you learn from them and feel can just pop over to Taiwan the energy and culture, it and get inexpensive, great adds something more [to tea that you couldn't get in the tea]." the U.S.," he says. Sebastian Beckwith, Lorien's story is a typifounder of New York tea cal one: Many of the chalcompany In Pursuit of Tea, lenges and surprises of adds that delving into tea sourcing from origin are cultures can be valuable in known only to those who making marketing decisions have already been there. about teas. When you see Heading to China, Taiwan, how tea plays a role in other India, or other producing lands, you can translate it nations involves logistical to your own business. "You and cultural struggles that have to have some idea of can take numerous trips to what it is before you can finally move beyond. know how to market with To help more tea pros it," he says. efficiently experience oriLorien says that the main gin firsthand and source benefits from his first origin great leaf directly, I've trip came on the cultural compiled guidance from side. Highlights included Lorien and three seasoned meeting the people who tea importers. These tips grow, manufacture and will allow you to better bring tea to market, as well understand when to go, as getting hands-on expewhere to head in different rience with several steps countries, what to expect of the tea manufacturing from your efforts and how process. The connections to avoid getting swindled Lorien developed with the SEBASTIAN BECKWITH (LEFT) IN CHINA along the way. source, culture, environment and people behind the tea will also influence his customers. Firsthand experience ARE YOU HERE FOR BUSINESS OR "impacts customers because their experience was thirdhand CULTURE? before and now it's secondhand. We were all brought up a notch. Industry travelers head out on their sojourns for a variety of We are elevated through these experiences." reasons, but most trips fall into one of two categories: doing busiFong also notes that it's important to account for the indirect ness or increasing cultural knowledge around tea and tea growing. benefits of visiting origin. For example, Fong spends a large Both have value to tea professionals, but it's important to know amount of time and money each year to produce a mere seven or what your exact aim is before you arrive at a destination. so kilograms of Lotus Heart Dragonwell. He actually loses money Roy Fong, co-owner of San Francisco's Imperial Tea Court, has on that tea, but he sells three to four tons of lower grades of been sourcing tea directly from producers since the mid-1980s, Dragonwell each year, in part because of the prestige of offering and he now goes to source a minimum of three times a year. He Lotus Heart. "If you want to be apart from everybody else, you says that experiencing tea origins firsthand is essential for speak- have to pay for it," Fong says. continued on page 46 freshcup.com February 2013 45