"New to Pu -- Share 'n' Taste" (Alternative to "pu-box")

[jackdaniel]

I'm new to pu, and new to this forum. I've been drinking pu, green, oolong, and black tea for the past year after my switch over from "the dark side" (coffee).

I'd like to join one of the pu-swap boxes, but it seems it takes some time for people to get around to them. As an alternative, I'd like to offer to ship some of my pu (samples, of course) to member willing to offer their "expert" opinion/advice. I would expect them to do the same in kind.

If anyone would like to take me up on this offer, or possibly start a sort of club, please PM me. I'll wait until I have a few answers, and then ship out the samples free of charge. We can then skype/email a week later about our tasting sessions and share notes, and the process repeats itself.

Any takers?

[bryan_drinks_tea]

Jack,

I really only have one pu-erh cake at the moment, but I would really like to get involved in this somehow as well. I know its a lot of money to order those cakes from China, and being a college student, I can't exactly blow 300 bucks on tea, or anything for that matter. i'm willing to join you in your idea, but I'm not sure how much I can actually participate. I'm defintely willing to send out a sample of my CCNP Shu for whoever might want to try it. I just need some pics for you guys, i guess.

Bryan

[Drax]

I'd be willing to start a new pu-box, but it's true, you'll go one by one, and it'll be about a week for each person. So it's slow.

Here's a possible alternative -- modify or ignore as you see fit.

Get a list of people who want to do a pu-erh swap.

The idea would be to mail samples (10g) of a number of pu to the other people. Then, everybody tries all the samples and posts their comments on the sample group.

If you get 10 people wanting to do it, you can break it down into 2 groups of 5, or maybe even 3, 3, 4, etc... whatever works.

I would recommend keeping groups small, and sample numbers small. For example, if 3 people swapped 3 types of pu'erh, you'd all be reviewing 9 samples together, which is a lot (assuming you've deconflicted and don't pass doubles). You should be expected to re-review the teas you send out to other people.

There's probably already a set way of doing this, but I thought I'd throw it out there as a possibility.

[jackdaniel]

Drax,

Good ideas. I think we're on the same page.

Anyone else have some comments/suggestions? Any want in?

[GoTea]

This seems like a great idea. The pity is that all these box passes and stuff are in America. i would be cool to start something here in Uk or even europe.

[xogget]

I'd love to get in on a tea share/swap also, though I won't be an exciting contributor as I have mostly 2007-2009 cakes.

[Drax]

Be sure to vote in this thread to add your choice to the mix.

For a tea-swap, if we get enough European or "geographically close" people together, we could make a circle swap to match.

But yeah, a box pass is going to be a lot more prohibitive for overseas passing for both time and cost.

[jackdaniel]

Well, I'm down for young sheng.

A circle swap, box pass, one-on-one or one-to-many swap (some of those sound dirty, better names?) all have their own merits.

I'm thinking of a way to organize such events, but the most difficult part seems to be the communication. I'll have to work on this...

[odarwin]

well just swap directly to "friends" a lot do this im sure.