Bok wrote: ↑Sun Sep 22, 2019 10:47 pm
Firstly welcome to the forum! I think we follow each others IG already
Maybe a silly question – why order from Western facing vendors, wouldn't you be able to get Yancha more economically and potentially better in China? Of course I know that the sourcing is hard even in China itself and prices are astronomical for the good stuff, but still?
Hi there. Thanks for all the teaware fomo on IG
It's a good question, and one that probably begets a dozen more questions. Regarding Wuyi Origin, their main business is mainland isn't it? I believe Cindy moves about 2,500 kg of yancha a year, with wholesale buyers (teahouses, etc) buying tens of kg lots and private tea circle group buys doing few kg level buys. She's a producer-vendor doing a mix of wholesale and direct-to-consumer, with probably a regular customer base numbering in the hundreds, and she's opened a side window facing West, probably to diversify her customer base. It's not exactly Western-facing in the sense that, say, LazyCat is.
I don't know of another mainland-focused yancha producer (not curator-vendors) doing direct sales to the West on a full lineup of teas on a click-n-buy webstore... If anyone knows of other examples I'd love to know.
I'm majority US-based and do buy a lot through Western-facing or Western-catering vendors. I've been curious where a vendor like Wuyi Origin stands among mainland drinkers, so for the past year I've been bringing back samples of most of her teas to Beijing, as well as having friends order samples directly from her as any other mainland customers would do, and tasting through and assessing compared to other yancha sources (there are so many, and it's hard to make sense of, but more on that later...). Some things I learned:
- Western webstore customers aren't paying more as far as I know, jin for jin, but at the end of the day paying a hefty premium simply because they're buying 25/75g packs.
- On the whole, the feeling is that these teas are skillfully made, even as they might not be the best materials, and they know how to make something tasty to fit with the prevailing market demand.
- Quality-wise, this is about what they would expect at these prices. One or two teas have stood out as quite good for the price, but the rest are in the "fair deal" category.
- Some doubts expressed about the source of these leaves. "How can fully hand-processed Wuyuanjian be this cheap?" And also, "Going by what's in the cup, wouldn't be surprise if not pure Zhengyan..." But again, prices seem to match expectations.
- Upon tasting through a lot of Western-purchased teas, they've expressed that it seems there's a minimum standard being met for Western-facing sales, whereas for mainland buyers trying a new vendor it's quite easy to just get crap tea.
So all this has been pretty interesting to assess so far, and I plan on continuing, more or less using Wuyi Origin as a case study for trying to understand where people are on both sides of the Pacific on yancha price/quality expectations. Would I buy from her otherwise? Yes, but being more picky about what looks promising, not so widely sampling more than half the yancha she sells.
Regarding LazyCat, a Western-facing vendor in the sense that I think you intend: Would I be able to buy the same teas cheaper in China if I knew the sources? Yes. Would it be cheaper if I had to do the digging and sourcing and traveling and such? Definitely not. I buy from LazyCat because I think they have good taste and some quite good teas, and I appreciate that the time and the effort to curate don't come for free. Mainland drinkers who buy through retail vendors are also paying a premium. The challenge there is finding the needles in haystacks upon haystacks; you can put in the effort, or just pay someone to do it.
Long story short, it seems you can get yancha more economically in China, and it can be potentially better but also potentially a lot worse. I remember one time, someone excited brought back a special yancha series sample pack that was quite pricey, produced by some famous tea professor in Xiamen, and we arranged a group tasting, and went through each sample one by one. Each one was just as disappointing as the one before. I said something like, "Well if we have to pick one, that TLH had the least amount of flaws, and ignoring cultivar expectations, it's pleasant." "But that's not what TLH is supposed to taste like!!" Queue lots of fuming.
The tendency I think is, if someone stumbles onto a source of good RG or whatever, they stick with it as long as they can. No one I know is assessing the hundreds of producers and the tens of thousands of vendors, and have a global sense of who's got which good yancha, harvest after harvest.
Excuse the long ramble, but I've been really curious to hear about other people's experiences along these lines.
