Taiwan Tea Guy

The 2008 Taipei Tea Expo was held at the end of November, and I apologize in not getting this report posted up sooner. I’ve had some frustrating computer issues to deal with, as well as a lot of work (Taiwan kindergartens and ‘cram schools’ like to put on huge Christmas shows to show off to the parents, so there’s a lot of preparation to do).  Anyway, the show this year wasn’t as big as 2007, but we still had a lot of fun. Here’s how it went:

Aliang won a packaging design award last year with his gift box set and High Mt. Tea series custom tins & bags, so this year we had shelf space in the OTOP display. (The top shelf in the photo at left). OTOP collects top-level products in a variety of industries and markets them internationally as ‘the best products of Taiwan’, and Aliang’s ChaTei product line is one of their featured teas.

I had to work Friday and Monday, so was only able to help out over the weekend. As usual, I spent most of my time manning the gaiwans. I’ve been working on my ‘doubles’ technique, and had fun showing off for the visitors. It was especially cool doing 2 different teas simultaneously - I think that’s TKY and 4 Seasons Oolong I’m pouring in the picture at left - so that people could quickly get samples of both teas, which sold briskly both days I was there.

When I wasn’t at the booth, I was checking out the shows & other displays. The tea demos were better this year (in my opinion), although I didn’t have time to see any on Saturday. The Lu Yu tea school has a large presence each year, and this time they did a mini-clinic on the Wu Wo style’ tea presentation, inviting attendees to join in and practice their skills.

They also had a ’synchronized tea brewing’ demonstration wonder if that will ever make it as an olympic event . . . hmmm . . . It was fun to watch, but it seems that the demos aren’t all that viewer friendly. There is a lot of noise and commotion going on around, but the shows themselves are pretty serious (almost somber) and there isn’t much interaction with the crowd. Aliang says that we should start preparing something to do for next year’s expo - he wants something a bit offbeat, with more viewer participation if possible, so we’ve got our thinking caps on. If anyone has suggestions, please post them here for me.

All in all, it was a fun weekend. We didn’t break even on our sales, but the real point was to get out, see and be seen, and get people to try our tea. Chinese New Year is coming up, and that’s a big gift-giving season here, so we’re hoping there will be a lot of orders for gift sets & extra tea to drink at home with the family.

This entry was posted on Sunday, January 4th, 2009 at 10:36 pm and is filed under My Tea Life. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.