Mei leaf

Guy Juan
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Wed Jul 17, 2019 7:48 pm

Baisao wrote:
Wed Jul 10, 2019 12:38 am
Guy Juan wrote:
Wed Jul 10, 2019 12:19 am
I’ll just order some of the best they have to offer and compare it to the vendors I’ve been ordering from. That will give me an idea of if meileaf is above or below that range.
Don’t forget to order a Shamwow.

B0578DE5-EEA5-4497-80BC-BF393C58EC2E.jpeg

j/k
I know you reeeeally need the attention and I should feed into it BUT.... The Shamwow actually works very well. Extremely absorbent for the size and weight too. The commercial was purposely created in a way that mocked infomercials (you might be too young to remember those?). It was sort of a parody on infomercials, with a product that worked. I would suggest using something like the GLH Hair System for your joke attempt...or...have you seen the Shake Wake? That one might be right up your alley ;)
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Baisao
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Wed Jul 17, 2019 7:54 pm

Guy Juan wrote:
Wed Jul 17, 2019 7:48 pm
I know you reeeeally need the attention and I should feed into it BUT.... The Shamwow actually works very well. Extremely absorbent for the size and weight too. The commercial was purposely created in a way that mocked infomercials (you might be too young to remember those?). It was sort of a parody on infomercials, with a product that worked. I would suggest using something like the GLH Hair System for your joke attempt...or...have you seen the Shake Wake? That one might be right up your alley ;)
It was a joke, guy.
chofmann
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Wed Jul 17, 2019 8:08 pm

Guy Juan wrote:
Wed Jul 17, 2019 7:31 pm
Baisao wrote:
Tue Jul 09, 2019 1:27 am

A friend of mine died last year of stomach cancer and I wonder if it was because she had to sample bad teas to curate high quality teas.

You asked for an opinion and many were given: sleazy marketing practices, mediocre tea quality, misinformation, deception, etc.

Just how badly do you want to look at that t-bone?
That’s ridiculous to assume tea gave your friend cancer. You have more of a chance contributing to cancer from the food you eat every day from your local grocery store.

To assume misinformation and/or deception, along with mediocre tea doesn’t come from YOUR personal favorite vendors is misinformed and outright naive in itself. I simply wanted to hear experiences with their tea. If you were to use examples of experience instead of regurgitating popular opinions and an assumptions rooted in no evidence at all, I might listen to ya. :D
The odds that the tea caused the issue are certainly very low.... but I've also heard some real horror stories about the use of certain chemicals / pesticides in tea.
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Baisao
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Wed Jul 17, 2019 9:01 pm

Guy Juan wrote:
Wed Jul 17, 2019 7:31 pm
A friend of mine died last year of stomach cancer and I wonder if it was because she had to sample bad teas to curate high quality teas.
There's a difference between assuming and wondering about the causation of something. I did not state that my friend died of cancer because of drinking bad tea. To do so would be to make an assumption. I do wonder about it because of the circumstances surrounding it. This person would have been drinking much more tea than the average person, some of it sprayed with pesticides in regions with low/no pesticide application compliance.

What's real world compliance like? Chlordane, for example, was banned in the US in 1988 but was still sold in China until 1997. Stocks of it are still around and used furtively, just as I witnessed in the US after the ban in '88: it was free post ban, it worked, and it's assumed we'll never see any harm from it. (Disclaimer: I never applied it or worked for anyone who did. I just witnessed its use post ban.) Despite the active ingredient (beta-Cyfluthrin) in Tempo being odorless, the carrier agent isn't oderless. I've twice smelled the carrier agent on Taiwanese teas and refuse to drink them.

I had my applicator's license and played it safe while I was in the business. I watched a coworker who did not play it safe die from throat cancer after just ten years in the business. I can't say that it was the pesticides, smoking, genetics, or bad luck that caused his terminal throat cancer. I'm not going to make assumptions. But I wonder.
Last edited by Baisao on Thu Jul 18, 2019 1:14 am, edited 1 time in total.
Chadrinkincat
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Wed Jul 17, 2019 9:32 pm

This thread has really gone off the rails.

Getting seriously ill/cancer from low or mediocre quality tea is highly unlikely unless your somehow able to drink 10,000lbs of laced tea w/o realizing how crappy you feel every time. 🙄I’m not loosing any sleep over the occasional pot of sea dyke.
chofmann
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Wed Jul 17, 2019 11:38 pm

Edit - Issue was fixed.
Last edited by chofmann on Thu Jul 18, 2019 9:08 am, edited 2 times in total.
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Baisao
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Thu Jul 18, 2019 12:48 am

chofmann wrote:
Wed Jul 17, 2019 11:38 pm
I feel like I was misquoted here :?: :cry:

@chofmann, sorry I misunderstood you. The quotes were all jacked up. Fixed it.
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TeaTotaling
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Sun Apr 26, 2020 5:14 pm

Guy Juan wrote:
Mon Jul 08, 2019 8:55 am
Ok well, some responses emit paranoia that someone from meileaf is trying to infiltrate the tea forums :lol:

I’ll check out their tea and compare it to other vendors and give my honest opinion. I expect based on responses here that they have overpriced mediocre tea. If I am pleasantly surprised I’ll make sure to spread the good word.
Did you ever try out tea from Mei Leaf? If so, what were your thoughts? I haven't really found much consensus on the tea Don sources. Everyone seems to get worked up over Don's previous claim about 1,600 year old trees. Heck, Global Tea Hut one up'd him, claiming 2,000 year old trees in Lincang.

...side note, when I search Mei Leaf in the search query, it will not register and the page doesn't load. Weird.
Noonie
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Sun Apr 26, 2020 5:51 pm

TeaTotaling wrote:
Sun Apr 26, 2020 5:14 pm
Guy Juan wrote:
Mon Jul 08, 2019 8:55 am
Ok well, some responses emit paranoia that someone from meileaf is trying to infiltrate the tea forums :lol:

I’ll check out their tea and compare it to other vendors and give my honest opinion. I expect based on responses here that they have overpriced mediocre tea. If I am pleasantly surprised I’ll make sure to spread the good word.
Did you ever try out tea from Mei Leaf? If so, what were your thoughts? I haven't really found much consensus on the tea Don sources. Everyone seems to get worked up over Don's previous claim about 1,600 year old trees. Heck, Global Tea Hut one up'd him, claiming 2,000 year old trees in Lincang.

...side note, when I search Mei Leaf in the search query, it will not register and the page doesn't load. Weird.
I have not tried Mei Leaf tea. I don't mind some of his videos and despite what some people say about this claims, style, etc., I'm not an expert so I won't refute what he says, and he's out there making a living and his tea videos are appreciated by me as there are not a lot of videos on tea (compared to other interests I have where online videos are more plentiful).

The main reason I wouldn't order his tea is the same reason I wouldn't order from many vendors: if the vendor is outside my home country or the vendor isn't located in the country where the tea is sourced, I can't see an economical reason to do so. I can order Pu'erh from a vendor in China, Sencha from a vendor in Japan...and I order a variety of different teas from vendors here in Canada, but to order say, Sencha from a vendor in the UK and have it shipped to Canada...do people actually do this? I've ordered from US vendors but we border them and I can usually get decent/free shipping, usually don't pay duty. In Canada we have ice wine (grown an hour from where I live), but for someone in UK to order Canadian icewine from a vendor in Japan...just doesn't make sense. Same with tea.
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Bok
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Sun Apr 26, 2020 6:53 pm

@Noonie you are right.

There is only one reason I can think of: if that vendor has an exclusive tea, or is sourcing some specialties which are difficult to find in the country of origin as well...

I had this with one particular Japanese tea that was the result of a personal connection to the tea in question, although the shop was based far away.
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aet
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Sun Apr 26, 2020 10:15 pm

Bok wrote:
Sun Apr 26, 2020 6:53 pm
Noonie you are right.

There is only one reason I can think of: if that vendor has an exclusive tea, or is sourcing some specialties which are difficult to find in the country of origin as well...
make sense,

the most of our foreign wholesale customers search for tea which their customers can not find also on CN internet , yet they are looking for the cheap stuff , because shipping fee, customs fees and their expenses for shop and living in their country. Same time their western customers are not ready to pay premium price for VIP tea because mostly can't spot the difference. Those who can, usually already have their own buying channels directly from the country of production mostly.

So many western vendors coming here might get something authentic on the side but it is economically not effective to do business with such a tea. To much labor ( time consuming ). We have people coming every spring and guiding / helping with tea sourcing and if come across some exclusive tea, they would mostly buy in small amount ( like 1kg / 1 cake or something ) for them selves or close friends because it's just not suitable for business.
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TeaTotaling
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Mon Apr 27, 2020 11:20 am

Noonie wrote:
Sun Apr 26, 2020 5:51 pm
TeaTotaling wrote:
Sun Apr 26, 2020 5:14 pm
Guy Juan wrote:
Mon Jul 08, 2019 8:55 am
Ok well, some responses emit paranoia that someone from meileaf is trying to infiltrate the tea forums :lol:

I’ll check out their tea and compare it to other vendors and give my honest opinion. I expect based on responses here that they have overpriced mediocre tea. If I am pleasantly surprised I’ll make sure to spread the good word.
Did you ever try out tea from Mei Leaf? If so, what were your thoughts? I haven't really found much consensus on the tea Don sources. Everyone seems to get worked up over Don's previous claim about 1,600 year old trees. Heck, Global Tea Hut one up'd him, claiming 2,000 year old trees in Lincang.

...side note, when I search Mei Leaf in the search query, it will not register and the page doesn't load. Weird.
I have not tried Mei Leaf tea. I don't mind some of his videos and despite what some people say about this claims, style, etc., I'm not an expert so I won't refute what he says, and he's out there making a living and his tea videos are appreciated by me as there are not a lot of videos on tea (compared to other interests I have where online videos are more plentiful).

The main reason I wouldn't order his tea is the same reason I wouldn't order from many vendors: if the vendor is outside my home country or the vendor isn't located in the country where the tea is sourced, I can't see an economical reason to do so. I can order Pu'erh from a vendor in China, Sencha from a vendor in Japan...and I order a variety of different teas from vendors here in Canada, but to order say, Sencha from a vendor in the UK and have it shipped to Canada...do people actually do this? I've ordered from US vendors but we border them and I can usually get decent/free shipping, usually don't pay duty. In Canada we have ice wine (grown an hour from where I live), but for someone in UK to order Canadian icewine from a vendor in Japan...just doesn't make sense. Same with tea.
Understood, well said. A logical approach indeed.
Jeanbb
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Tue Jun 23, 2020 7:02 am

Hi, after reading this thread I felt the overall nature of responses were egregious enough to single-handedly compel me to write a response.

I'd consider myself of moderate but above average experience in the tea world (Chinese/Taiwanese teas specifically) from what I typically see even in communities like this, I've browsed various tea related forums and resources for a while but never specifically engaged or paid too much attention to brand or dealer related supremacy. I don't know what the most highly regarded general (or specific) sources for tea here are, but I've bought at minimum a few hundred dollars worth from Crimson Lotus, Yunnan Sourcing, Taiwan Sourcing, Eco-cha, What-cha, Kuura, Teavivre and of course, Mei Leaf. Again I'm not aware of which vendors here are recommended but elsewhere they're either highly regarded or consistently at least acknowledged to sell a variety of good teas at fair prices. My most used vendor is easily YS and I enjoy Scott's video style much more than ML as well.

Personally I don't particularly enjoy Mei Leafs videos although think Don is overall a good source of information to beginners and has a much better sense for tasting and appreciating quality of teas than most vendors. Scott from YS for example I would consider to have an excellent sense for puerh and tea in general however when it comes to other varietals there are a lot of low quality, dud teas advertised as "imperial grade" such as their silver needles or jin jun mei sold in his store. I will say and with emphasis however, that the vast majority of Mei Leaf teas I tried (about half the collection via samplers) had distinctiveness, reasonable quality leaves and overall met the standards of other constantly acknowledged vendors. In fact I would say in general that they were above average standards and in some examples such as their various silver needle offerings, HUGELY exceeded the level I have experienced at the majority of highly regarded vendors. Even in terms of puerh, I can't say a single one of Mei Leafs offerings were below par or bad teas, I can't say the same even for all the puerh specific vendors I've bought from. They didn't meet the pinnacle standards Don markets his teas as either, but quite frankly I don't care and there is no reason to if the tea is good and as advertised. One poster mentions their dong ding not being authentic as is acknowledged on their website as a somewhat similarly processed tea from Alishan, I've had a lot of dong ding and regardless of authenticity I can't say I've had one more enjoyable than the Mei Leaf even if it doesn't necessarily taste specifically of one either. The price is very high all things considered, but if the tea is enjoyable I can't say I'd recommend against someone trying a sampler.

Are they fairly priced? If you consider that the production value of their Youtube videos, having a storefront in London and coming from there to begin with, I would say they still are somewhat overpriced, however a variety of their teas are distinct enough to warrant a purchase regardless. If we disregard their location, marketing and engagement on Youtube then no there are preferable vendors in general. As someone else rationally mentioned, if you live on the other side of the world, it doesn't make a whole lot of sense to buy from Mei Leaf. They do have a few examples of teas that I personally would buy if I lived in the vicinity however. For a beginner, I would recommend they try samples from a wide variety of vendors to develop their palate and get a grasp of how to judge quality. Against Mei Leaf, I do think the claim in question about 1000 year old teas is absolutely absurd but they seem to have moved away from that and my experience with their puerhs has been largely very positive. Even on price I think it fares well with other vendors in this area.

Now to the responses in this thread.. to put it simply, a large complaint of Mei Leaf here is that they are overly focused on marketing largely for the sake of profiting off a low information segment of the market. Well the majority of posts from anti-Mei Leaf users here say LITERALLY NOTHING about the teas, don't reflect proof they've ever tried the teas or resort to outlandish, factually incorrect statements to criticise them. They boil down to empty, overly emotional criticism with zero factual basis. In other words, THEY'RE PURE MARKETING. As someone with a reasonably solid grounding in experience with tea, what I feel like I am looking at here is a cult that is more interested in marketing their own ideology than giving honest information about tea. I came to this forum to find information on some potential vendors for Japanese and Korean tea which I am less knowledgeable about and also to find some good vendors for silver needles. The low information, overly emotional and often thoughtless comments I see here from some posters makes me consider that most people here are either liars or know less than I do.

For example, an early ridiculous comment and nonsensical criticism from one poster:
The bizarre terms like "Young Gushu" ( Young Ancient Tree ...I'm not a native Eng. speaker , but I believe those two terms are contradictory )
I'll give him the benefit of the doubt that he isn't a native English speaker, but its blatantly obvious it refers to a young, or newly pressed cake of puerh produced from old arbor. Hence "young gushu". For example, a tea is harvested and pressed in 2019 from trees that are 300 years old is a young gushu. New production, old trees. Yet this poster goes on a long winded rant trying to suggest that Mei Leaf is being dishonest. The worst part is that this terminology is used so often that it makes me wonder how knowledgeable they actually are themselves. I have no idea if they're either deliberately playing dumb to make Mei Leaf look bad to OP who is obviously a beginner, if he doesn't know what young sheng is or if his understanding of English is worse than it seems. Either way, its such a sad, silly thing to watch someone deliberately misinterpret something obvious, making themselves look clueless yet turn it into an insult against someone else.

They spend multiple paragraphs clearly trying to emphasise that Mei Leaf are salesmen selling mediocre tea at a high margin, not a serious vendor yet at the same time acknowledge they've never tried the tea. How is this remotely rational?

Some other ridiculous comments:
Their teas are relatively expensive considering most taste like cardboard. :lol:
Clearly from someone who has never had their tea or has the tea tasting palate of a dog. As is typical in this thread, the person in question doesn't mention or prove any direct experience with their teas. Just a blatantly hyperbolic comment based on seemingly nothing.

From Chadrinkincat:
Chadrinkincat wrote:
Sat Jul 06, 2019 4:59 pm
+1 for all the negative feedback.
Again, absolutely no actual reference to a specific tea or even their tea in general. Just an arbitrary negative comment that doesn't even make it appear they've had a Mei Leaf tea. A pattern across this thread.

And the most ridiculous:
What’s the harm in drinking mediocre or bad teas, you might ask?

Well, they can make you ill or at least feel ill. I recently felt sick from a bad sample of tea. It was so bad I put a serious pause on my tea drinking.

One person here mentioned the catch in the throat commonly associated with improper pesticide applications after drinking a tea from ML.

A friend of mine died last year of stomach cancer and I wonder if it was because she had to sample bad teas to curate high quality teas.

Bad teas make you feel bad. It’s the same with cheap wines, just ask your sommelier, chef.
Yes that's right, apparently on this forum we have posters who quite literally will reference stomach cancer in a thread about Mei Leaf and implicitly suggest they could do the same for you, that they are ridden with pesticides (again, zero proof) and that they could make you feel sick. This is quite frankly, flippant defamation from someone who I suspect hasn't even tried their tea. Imagine complaining about "sleazy marketing practices" in the same post as implying that Mei Leaf could give you stomach cancer or even that the tea will make you "feel bad". There's no reason to trust a single thing a poster like this writes. Hyperbolic, overly emotional, shill nonsense.

Thank God Bok as seemingly the only rational poster here claims the following:
Bok wrote:
Sat Jul 06, 2019 1:01 am
If you want to go about it in the most objective way:

Get the same kind of teas in similar pricing from different vendors and try them side by side in identical porcelain gaiwans/or competition cupping sets.

That is the only way to be sure.
Again, I wasn't even going to create an account on this forum but the behaviour and comments from some of the posters are just so utterly off the rails and dishonest that I felt a need to. A lot of people here making themselves look bad and reflecting poorly on the forum. I haven't bought from Mei Leaf in a long while and they wouldn't be the first place I'd recommend for high end teas, but I would absolutely say that the idea of buying a variety of samplers to compare among various vendors would be an educational and enjoyable experience. I'm interested to hear if OP ever ended up trying them.

But hey, maybe I'm wrong and everyone here bashing Mei Leaf are aristocratic multi-millionaires daily drinking new village Bing Dao, Lao Ban Zhang direct from the farmer and top grade west lake longjing, while I'm just an impoverished pleb with low grade tastes drinking cheap, crappy tea. Either that or a lot of elitists who make comments on tea they've never had here. Who knows.
Last edited by pedant on Tue Jun 23, 2020 11:37 am, edited 1 time in total.
Reason: mod edit: added formatting to quotes for aesthetic reasons
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pedant
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Tue Jun 23, 2020 11:47 am

hi @Jeanbb,

firstly, though you said you weren't planning on registering, welcome to the forum :mrgreen:
whatever the reason, we're glad to have you here.

thanks for sharing your experience with ML's teas and for contributing to this heated discussion. i enjoyed reading your response.

a minor point regarding this bit:
Jeanbb wrote:
Tue Jun 23, 2020 7:02 am
Their teas are relatively expensive considering most taste like cardboard. :lol:
Clearly from someone who has never had their tea or has the tea tasting palate of a dog. As is typical in this thread, the person in question doesn't mention or prove any direct experience with their teas. Just a blatantly hyperbolic comment based on seemingly nothing.
just fyi, the user in question did later post "proof" of experience by stating that he made multiple orders, and he also furnished a screenshot of an order. i just state this to preempt an angry response. also, i've met the person in question, and i can say that he's an experienced drinker FWIW.

finally, i'm aware of how you worded your statement, but you still did virtually insult his taste.
if possible, please keep in mind our first rule: rules#civility
pedant wrote:
Tue Dec 05, 2017 10:16 pm
  • Be good to one another both in public and in private.
  • Avoid making ad hominem attacks.
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Balthazar
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Tue Jun 23, 2020 1:11 pm

Welcome to the forum, @Jeanbb. Hope you stick around, even though you originally did not intend to create an account :)

I think it's good etiquette to notify the people you address in your criticism, especially when referring to them as shills (for whom by the way?) and their comments as "ridiculous". You can do this either by using the quote function or typing "@" followed by the user's name. That way they will receive a site notification, and be able to respond.

I have no horse in this particular race, and as I've never tried any of Mei Leaf's teas I can't say anything about their quality in absolute or relative (to price) terms. I think it's the outrageous claims, the most memorable being the 1600 years old trees claim, and the general "fluffy" video-style that has made the brand off-putting to a lot of people. It's certainly one of the reasons I personally haven't made an order.

Another reason is that it's really hard to believe that a tea importer that has to pay rent for a teahouse in London is going to offer similar quality for the money than what I can get from vendors (or individual collectors) operating out of Asia. This of course is not unique for Mei Leaf. The French chain Palais des Thés maintains stores around Europe, including in Oslo where I live. There's no way they can offer anything even close to "good value". So if I were to buy something from there today, it would be to support their existence more than hoping to find a gem.
But hey, maybe I'm wrong and everyone here bashing Mei Leaf are aristocratic multi-millionaires daily drinking new village Bing Dao, Lao Ban Zhang direct from the farmer and top grade west lake longjing, while I'm just an impoverished pleb with low grade tastes drinking cheap, crappy tea. Either that or a lot of elitists who make comments on tea they've never had here. Who knows.
I don't think anyone is suggesting their teas are too cheap. You'll find plenty of good feedback on vendors at the same or a significantly cheaper price point, YS being an obvious example. I also don't think the elitism charge is warranted. If you look around Reddit and Steepster threads there are plenty of people critical of Mei Leaf, their marketing, and their price/quality ratio.

Also, I think it's kind of ironic that you're sarcastically writing "new village Bing Dao" and Lao Ban Zhang, seeing how out of 13 puers currently on Mei Leaf's raw puer page, all besides two have "gushu" claims attached to them. One of them is supposedly even "sourced from crazy old tea trees in the hallowed forests of Bing Dao". That one "makes your mouth fizz" and may "cause excitability, giggliness and a floaty and shaking feeling in the legs with an almost narcotic dreaminess". Too bad it's sold out, I could use something like that in these COVID days...
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