Found at Wegman's: Adagio Brand Fruit Sangria!!!!

[keelyn]

I went to Wegman's (a grocery store for those of you who don't know) and was browsing the tea area. Hidden high above the Numi Teas and other bagged gourmet tea in the health food section was a strange yet familiar sight - two Adagio 4 oz tea canisters of different kinds.

The types: "Imperial Earl Grey" and "Fruit Sangria." Now, I can't stand Earl Grey, but I can imagine it would be a likely choice to package and sell to the mass market. But, what is Fruit Sangria? Will it be a new product for the website? Or is it another product targeted at the mass market? As far as i can tell it isn't an existing adagio herbal tea under a new name.

The ingredients: hibiscus, apples, cranberries, orange peels, lemongrass, sunflower petals, natural and artificial (!) flavors.

I picked it up for $7.99 but haven't tried it yet. It does smell like sangria, however!

So, what's going on here?

I'm not terribly familiar with Adagio's herbals, but i will give it a review and might post a picture of it or two if anyone else is intrigued.

[rhpot1991]

Fruit Sangria is really this:
http://www.adagio.com/herbal/fruit_medley.html

At my Wegmans they also carried an adagio oolong, I forget which one though.

-John

[TeaFanatic]

That's pretty cool, I wish that I had a grocery store that sold adagio teas!

[keelyn]

@rhpot:

Fruit medley was indeed my first guess at what the Sangria might be. However, a quick look at the ingredients proves the theory wrong:

In the medley: raspberry, strawberry, hibiscus flowers, blackberry, apples, rose hips, elderberry and bilberry

In the sangria: hibiscus, apples, cranberries, orange peels, lemongrass, sunflower petals, natural and artificial flavors

So, lots of berries in the medley, only cranberries in sangria!
The only thing they have in common are hibiscus and apples!

I did get to drinking the sangria last night, and i found it to be fabulous. Unfortunately I cannot compare it with other adagio fruit teas, but I can tell you it did taste remarkably like sangria, with the orange peels giving it a great zest and the hibiscus sweet but not overpowering. If the grocery store discontinues this, I may be very sad!

So, admins or anyone else, what's up with this stuff?

[ilya]

Indeed, the fruit sangria is a unique blend created especially for retail sales. Hopefully, in the weeks and months to come, your local Wegmans/Whole Foods/etc will stock it.

[Marlene]

Waaaahh! Sob sob! Nobody sells Adagio around here I want some!

[jogrebe]

Indeed, the fruit sangria is a unique blend created especially for retail sales. Hopefully, in the weeks and months to come, your local Wegmans/Whole Foods/etc will stock it.

Can Adagio put out a list of the retail store chains that sell your teas so we can know which local stores have them in stock?

[peachaddict]

Waaaahh! Sob sob! Nobody sells Adagio around here I want some!

None here either . Guess some of us in the western U.S. will have to wait a while for it to be in stores here, 'cause that Sangria one sounds nice.

[keelyn]

Might I ask why you have a retail-only tea blend? And are you considering creating more retail-only blends? I don't quite understand from a business perspective why Adagio would put products on the shelves of a limited number of stores (at least to begin with) that are not available on the website.

It makes sense to me that you would want to put your products in stores so that brick-and-mortar shoppers would have an introduction to the Adagio brand and then visit the website and maybe make additional purchases.

But why create blends that your existing internet customers can't get?

Thanks for responding Ilya, please expound on this some more!!!

~keelyn
(expecting a BS/MS in science, not in marketing!)

[ilya]

The marketing reason behind having some teas available only in the retail channel is that certain stores/tearooms are uncomfortable competing with an online site. They are looking for some exclusive products that create repeat business.

[rhpot1991]

I swear Richard told me that the sangria and fruit medley were one in the same. Ilya, are there any other retail only flavors, I saw 2 others at Wegmans, but I was working with the assumption that they were just a differently named product from the website.

[Marlene]

The marketing reason behind having some teas available only in the retail channel is that certain stores/tearooms are uncomfortable competing with an online site. They are looking for some exclusive products that create repeat business.

Well, certain stores/tearooms are very selfish then. I can't get the sangrea tea here in utah because no one carries adagio in store, even when I've asked for it. I love sangrea. *goes of and sulks in the corner casting sad glanses at the outlets wanting exclusivity, therefore depriving me of a lovely herbal tea*

[keelyn]

Marlene, I may be interested in making a tea trade with you if you have anything you wanna trade. I'll go buy another 4 oz. Sangria if you have some samples or whatnot that I'm interested in. PM me for details.

This goes for just about anyone else who's dying to try this stuff. Remember though, there's only a limited amount left at the store!

[jogrebe]

The marketing reason behind having some teas available only in the retail channel is that certain stores/tearooms are uncomfortable competing with an online site. They are looking for some exclusive products that create repeat business.

Well, certain stores/tearooms are very selfish then.

That is actually very common and happens all the time. Like its common practice especially around the holiday season for a certain toys store chain to pay extra for a certain product in exchange for being the only ones that it is supplied to. Often better quality pens end up having certain "special editions" that can only be bought from a single supplier and in some crazy cases you end up with things like certain colors of fountain pen ink that a certain online retailer has bought exclusive rights to market, which are luckily more unusual shades that the typical person would not want to fill their pen with. Thus since its already a common practice I'm not surprised that corporate customers have approached adagio about wanting a custom private blend made only for them to sell. I only wish adagio would put up a complete list of these custom blends and listings of where they can be bought from as that would benefit both us and the companies that bought exclusive rights to sell them.

[Marlene]

Oh, I understand WHY. But I'm still out some Sangrea tea.