Hello to all at Tea Chat. This is my first posting! I’m working at
Rishi Tea as the Customer Support Guru.
I noticed this thread on the first World Tea Championship that was
held at the World Tea Expo. It seems like there was a lack of
information in regards to the competition at the show. I noticed that
the World Tea Expo site has uploaded some helpful information about
this event. You can see it here:
http://www.worldteaexpo.com/additional- ... nship.html
I think it’s important to note specifically the section regarding
“Statistical Methodology for Eliminating Bias and Error.” Charles
Cain and Joshua Kaiser were not able to judge in most of the
categories in the finals because many of the teas from each of their
respective companies reached those final categories.
Another thing to note is that not every company entered teas into
every category. Those entries were also done so voluntarily by each
company.
In regards to Hou De, I am not sure if they participated in the
competition. If they did not submit, that would account for why they
were not in the final round.
Pu-erh was not forgotten or left out. Initially Pu-erh was a
category; unfortunately it had to be dropped because of lack of
submissions. Hopefully for the 2009 competition more companies will
submit Pu-erh!
We are hoping that this event gets more entrants and more attention
in the future because we feel that the United States could use a
competition to help educate and promote high quality teas. Tea
competitions are very common throughout the major tea producing regions.
I hope this clarifies some of the confusion and rumors circulating in
the tea world. Feel free to contact us with any further questions or
concerns. We want to make sure that everybody receives accurate
information instead of relying on the assumptions of others.
Thanks to TeaChat and all those who participate for spreading the word of the leaf!
Susana
Mainly greens and a few of the oolongs. 
I don't recall all of the other winners, but Rishi won quite a few.
