Ten Ren? Is it good tea?

I have no particular interest in defending Ten Ren, although I enjoyed my one visit there. But what Rick describes is *one instance* of dishonest business practices. True, if it happened to me, it might be enough to keep me away in the future. I got food poisoning at Applebee's in 1993, and not only would I rather starve than eat there, I curse them whenever I see one of their advertisements, LOL. But still, such an instance is not enough to condemn the whole enterprise everywhere and forever.

There is also more opportunity for dishonesty, since most Americans basically know bad coffee, but are not particularly savvy about tea. Not that this justifies such practices in any way, shape, or form.

Michael Plant wrote:

It happened to me in Toronto and in NY. If I didn't speak some Chinese, I wouldn't have been able to communicate with the little girls in either shop. On top of that, the girls had little to none knowledge on anything related to tea; I guessed they were relatives of the manager or something.

In my mind, and this may be harsh, any sane person should stay away from Ten Ren unless they are buying the dirt cheap tea that TenRen's peddling. Granted, even that is probably being sold at a high price.

And yes,

This is how the Chinese do business with foreigners.

If most Americans basically know bad coffee, they must love it. That probably explains why vendors are so eager to satisfy the demand.

/Lew

snipped-for-privacy@u72g2000cwu.googlegroups.com5/12/06

I'm afraid it's SOP with them. Hardly a one instance thing, sorry to have to say. Michael

Lewis snipped-for-privacy@panix1.panix.com5/12/06 11: snipped-for-privacy@panix.com

I actually know somebody who, in his coffee drinking days, roasted his own beans, insuring quality. Cool. Michael

Right; that would be me. The aroma of coffee beans roasting is something I still miss (not at all like that of coffee brewing, but strangely floral.)

/Lew

I have been to both the Rockville and NYC shops and never had a problem finding someone who spoke English. They may not have known very much about the teas they were selling, but they have always been polite to me and willing to make individual cups so I could try different grades.

Actually, the lower grade teas from Ten Ren are very inexpensive. I tend to buy the next-to-lowest grade stuff from them, as I agree the higher grade teas are overpriced. I like their Oriental Beauty tea a lot and have not seen an equivalent elsewhere. Their lapsang souchong is pretty dreadful. The oolongs are all over the place in quality.

Americans too. If they don't take you seriously and you don't seem to be someone who knows what they are buying and whom they wish to cultivate a business relationship, you will be taken by merchants of ANY nationality.

--scott

S'right. Just ask any female who tries to get an honest estimate on car repair. Which of China's provinces do those mechanics come from? LOL.

Scott Dorsey wrote:

Can I ask when that was? In the early 1980's, the NYC Ten Ren girls would gladly make cup after cup of gungfu tea in the back for me and my friends. But, nowadays they seem satisfied with throwing a styrofoam cup of jasmine into my hand. As for their English, I suppose I've been a bit harsh, but more often than not they have nothing useful to say.

I am not saying that their tea is bad, per se; just that it begins to take on a generic quality that gets quickly boring. That's of course nothing but my ever so humble opinion. I'm fond of their Oriental Beauty myself.

Seems as though at this juncture in their business history they've cultivated these faults. I imagine that with more security this will improve. But what do I know,

Michael

Not that this has anything to do with tea, but if Chinese business practices, especially towards foreigners, are something that you find interesting, you might want to check out "Negotiating China" by Carolyn Blackman.

Pretty recently, although it's been maybe six months since I have been to the Rockville store and a couple years since I went into the NYC store.

It's true, though, that I have gone into the NYC store only knowing exactly what I wanted to begin with. The last time I went in, I was with a friend from out of town and we walked in and I asked about several kinds of tea and if they could make cups for him to taste, and they were quite good about it.

A lot of their teas do, and most of them are basically variants of the same green variety with more or less similar flavours. They don't have a huge amount of variety among the main line, it's true. And they don't really have any black teas other than their generic "black" line, which is nothing impressive, the lapsang souchong, about which the less said the better, and the "oriental beauty" which I think is the real standout.

I hope so. And as someone who just bought a house, I can certainly say that this sort of behaviour is more common than just in Chinese tea vendors.

--scott

An interesting advice I've gotten from a tea merchant about places like Ten Ren is this -- buy their cheapest tea.

It might sound weird, but if you buy their cheapest tea, it's likely to be fresh because people buy it all the time. if you buy their expensive stuff, it's likely stuff that's been sitting in the same canister for ages because nobody buys them.

And thinking about it, it makes a lot of sense.

That makes a certain amount of sense, but it also puts a ceiling on the quality of the tea. Another way to aim for freshness at Ten Ren is to buy their foil-sealed seasonal oolongs.

/Lew

Also a good point, but you may not be able to try them before buying (although you can often buy them in little sample packs).

I once got a sample pack of various different teas in bags at the Rockville store, which were very, very very stale. In the bag you also have no idea what the stuff is like until you get it home.

With Ten Ren, if you get their _highest_ grade tea, you'll also be okay, because they don't stock it and they'll have to order it in special. But the difference between their highest and lowest grades isn't enough to warrant the difference in price to me.

--scott

I found that in most of the TenRen shops that I visited, they are trying to play the "stupid foreigner" card. They treat their customers as if they know diddly-squat about tea and the mark-up in price reflects that. Actually, there's a high percentage chance that if any one of us walked into any given TenRen, that we may know more about tea than the girls working there. The whole myth/mystery/magic idea that Chinese people are the masters of tea in the whole world just doesn't hold water.

Tea has two faces: Business and Culture. TenRen, as are most shops that I've visited outside of China, is more concerned about the former and not the latter. Keep this in mind when shopping there.

I know it is 15 years since you asked, but I really enjoy tea from Ten Fu, Ten Ren's subsidiary in China for Chinese teas. Far more so than the parent company's tea,

Do they sell outside of China?

I do like some of the Ten Ren teas but others I don't like, and in many lines they have a wide range of different grade products at widely varying prices but not quite so great quality ranges between them.

--scott