Was the cake worth $100 to you, the one you bought? It sounds like it was.ImmortaliTEA wrote:Yes it was a name your own price type of scenario but at first he was trying to sell me the entire tong for the same price he paid for it 7 years ago ($500) because he is a native of Anxi and only drinks medium roasted Anxi Ball oolongs and knows nothing about Puerh tea, until I told him it didn't seem as old as he was told at which point he said to name my own price and I told him I would buy that first cake for $100 and seek further knowledge about it on the internet (you guys) to back up my hypothesis based on the tasting. He promised to hold on to the rest of the tong exclusively for me when I found out more information and decided whether or not I wanted the remaining 6 beengs. Now I am stuck in a moral battle with myself because a part of me wants to inform him that he has some tea that's worth a pretty penny, in which case I wouldn't be able to afford anymore cakes. However, the other part of me thinks that all of this happened to me for a reason and since he doesn't know what he has his hands on, I should just buy the entire tong for $600 more. What would the true tea master do in this situation? (Subjective but curious nonetheless). Thank you!MarshalN wrote:Well, did the guy offer you a price, or did he give you a "name your own price" option? Then we have something to work with.
If you are talking about 25 years old dry stored 88Qing, one cake will set you back $1000 these days, USD. Wet stored 90s? At least a few hundred bucks a piece, depending on where you buy it from, what condition its in, etc etc etc. So, unless this guy is asking for $1000 a piece, you're not going to be overpaying.
ImmortaliTEA-
How you want to deal with him is up to you, I guess. Purely as a tea trade, taking out the human element, I'd say the tea sounds like it's well worth the money.
There are a few stores in Hong Kong that sells teas are what are sub-market prices because the owners, like the guy you talked about here, believes only in oolongs and thinks puerh is crap, so they don't sell it for much because they don't value it. That's their choice, and since they label their teas with clear cut prices, one can pay whatever they ask for. I don't pay them more, because that's what they wanted in the first place. It's the same when I go to Taiwan and find aged oolongs sometimes for cheap. They know there are people who sell the tea for more out there, but they don't want to do it. They're happy, I'm happy. Win-win. In this case, it might be that you have an ignorant seller. At the same time, just because there's a price out there doesn't mean he'll find a market for it - it's not like he's going to haul the tea back to Hong Kong and then try to pawn it off here (and if he were to do it, he won't fetch a very good price anyway). So selling to you might not be such a bad thing after all.