A VERY momentous day today.
Rare Tea launches at Waitrose. I’m so proud. I love Waitrose and it has always been the Shangri La of shops for me. I always dreamed of seeing Rare Tea on the shelves and today it really happened. Well, 20 London stores to start with. But it’s a big start.
This really is a massive step. I’m shaky as a baby giraffe with hope and excitement.
I’m really proud to announce our re-design.
Rare Tea has undergone a subtle but significant transformation. Today everything is looking a bit different at www.rareteacompany.com.
The website has been smartened up with the inestimable of help of Artlogic.
And it doesn’t stop there.
The tea itself has been re-packaged. Rob Hall of Studio H has done an amazing job re-designing the whole look of Rare Tea. He has kept the packaging understated and yet gorgeous.
I didn’t want Rare Tea to be one of those companies that spends more on its packaging than on the tea.
But as so many of you told me, my tea deserved better than the old pouches.
Given that we are struggling through a financial crisis I hope you’ll find the new smaller packs opportune and the new canisters desirable. I know it’s more packaging. But it’s re-usable and recyclable and it will keep your tea fresh.
This isn’t the cheapest tea on the market, but it is the best. And now, I hope you’ll agree, it looks the part.
I thought I’d let you know that it’s not just you that gets free tea.
This morning I’m sipping a lovely tea from Georgia sent to me by an extremely kind customer who discovered it whilst on a recent trip.
This really is a treat and I am sincerely grateful.
The comment by John to the previous post got me thinking.
He’s right, if you start blending teas you’re going to have to buy more. Was it all just a crafty ruse to make you buy two packets instead of one?
I’d hate for you to think Rare Tea was the kind of company that came up with crafty ruses. (For one thing- I’m just not clever enough.)
And if I’m trying to revive the art of tea-blending I ought to offer you some encouragement.
So…
If you want to blend you’re own Green Silver Tip Tea just order one packet of White Silver Tip Tea and I’ll add a free sample of Green Whole Leaf Tea to blend it with. All you have to do is send an email at the time of ordering with the subject header:
Free Green Tea Please
To: cs@rareteacompany.com
This offer is open for two weeks until the 12th November.
I’d be really grateful if you’d let me know how you get on.
If you click this link it will take you to the Telegraph website where Alexander McCall Smith is writing an on-line novel Corduroy Mansions. Chapter 20 is called Rare Tea and you’re not going to believe this but he actually mentions me and my tea. Its about the seventh paragraph down that begins
“The onset of rain decided the matter…”
I was doing a tasting at Daylesford Organics when I met this very charming man. He actually seemed to listen with interest to my tea-waffle. I can go on and on and people have been known to flag but if he did, he most gallantly didn’t show it. And now this! He wrote me into his new book.
Chuffed doesn’t begin to describe it.
One thing- if it’s good enough for Wittgenstein it’s good enough for me.
Committed to advancing the pursuit of male indulgence, Dunhill has opened a new place in Mayfair at Bourdon House the old home of the Duke of Westminster.
It has a barbers; a spa; a walk in humidor; a bespoke tailors and a bar. It’s all very, very splendid. And you can order the very finest tea. Yes, yes Rare Tea is there to be sipped and savoured by all of London’s most wonderful dandies.
People are always asking if we have a shop. I’m sorry we don’t. Not yet, anyway. NW1 is our office and I’m afraid we don’t sell tea from here. But if you are in the area our local deli does- the effortlessly glamorous Melrose and Morgan and they do have a stock of our teas and glass tea pots.
This afternoon I was interviewed on Ireland’s Newstalk radio with Sean Moncrieff. I was so nervous that my hand shook and the phone clattered against my earring. I suppose I wouldn’t have noticed the clatter if I hadn’t had an echo on the line. That was lucky then. A fraction of a second after I spoke I could hear myself repeated back. It was a bit disconcerting listening to my waffle as I waffled. I stumbled and tripped over every word unable to concentrate on what I was saying which made me more nervous which made me worse.
If you were listening I’m sorry for being so rubbish. At least I took the earring off.
Today in the G2 section of the Guardian you can read about my quest for White Silver Tip Tea.
I was going to leave it at that and try to seem as though its an everyday occurrence that I get a piece published in the Guardian. But it’s not and I can’t. It’s brilliant.
This weekend the article about Rare Tea was ‘the most recommended’ in the National German newspaper DIE WELT’s Sunday supplement. You can read the full article here.
I’d like to welcome all my new German readers and thank them so much for their emails and orders. I’m so ignorant that I cannot actually read the article. I can only guess it says kind rather than slanderous things by your response and the great volume of orders coming from Germany this morning.