Different grades of Tieguanyin (Iron Goddess on Mercy)

[Tead Off]

Is anyone sure that the art of traditional TGY making is being lost? I'm not ready to believe that. The preponderance of TGY drinkers may like the green version, but, most of the 'serious' TGY lovers tend towards the traditional. Plenty of traditional makers around. The trick is to find a very good one. This can be as difficult as finding a good green TGY maker.

Many, including myself, think Taiwan teas are amongst the best in the world. But, I have drunk a lot of mediocre high mountain teas, mainly from Alishan but also other areas. I also rarely encounter a good Dong Ding. I don't think it's that easy to find really great tea anywhere. I bet those who live in Taiwan have gone through a lot of teas before stumbling on the gems. And, often when we finally find something great, we can't afford it! Maybe I was better off drinking Lipton tea.

[ABx]

Is anyone sure that the art of traditional TGY making is being lost? I'm not ready to believe that. The preponderance of TGY drinkers may like the green version, but, most of the 'serious' TGY lovers tend towards the traditional. Plenty of traditional makers around. The trick is to find a very good one. This can be as difficult as finding a good green TGY maker.

I was thinking the same. There market is always going to be flooded with the mass-made stuff, but then there's going to be a smaller quantity of more carefully made teas. The mass-market stuff is always going to be the most readily available and among the lowest quality, but that very well could leave them more time and resources to do a better job with the better stuff (e.g., they can buy better roasters because they don't need to buy as many, they can roast on a proper schedule because they don't have as much that has to be done, etc.). Lately, however, I've even been seeing more light-to-mid roast TGY in the cheap stuff.

[debunix]

I have yet to try a really fine high roast TGY. My standard that I "grew up" with was a decent but not great traditional roast TGY, and I've only had some truly lovely greener style, but no darker roast to match the wonderful Wuyi yanchas & dan conga I've had lately.

[wyardley]

Is anyone sure that the art of traditional TGY making is being lost? I'm not ready to believe that. The preponderance of TGY drinkers may like the green version, but, most of the 'serious' TGY lovers tend towards the traditional. Plenty of traditional makers around. The trick is to find a very good one. This can be as difficult as finding a good green TGY maker.

But I think a lot of the folks who are producing the teas you're talking about are a little long in the tooth, and from what I can tell, a lot of the younger generation is not so interested in learning about tea processing. With China's growth, especially in big cities and SEZs, a lot of young people in agricultural areas aren't staying in their villages.

My concern isn't so much that these teas can't still be found now, but that, from everything I've heard anecdotally anyway, many of the people who know how to produce them with skill are not passing this knowledge down. This is all hearsay, and there's always the tendency for people to say "things were better back in the day"... it's hard to say without some actual statistics, but I have a feeling we may have a harder finding these teas over the next 5-15 years, as some of these older masters retire or head up to the great tea fields in the sky.

I think there is some demand for high-fire TGY, especially in areas with a lot of overseas Chaozhou / Fujianese (Taiwan, HK, Malaysia, Singapore, etc), but as best I can tell, a lot of this still uses the same lower oxidation tea base as the greener stuff. Most of the shops that sell / roast this stuff don't have their own farms, so unless their order from one source is big enough to do a custom order, they're likely to be buying tea with whatever level of oxidation the farmer has chosen.

And most of the stuff that is on the market now (as far as Anxi grown "traditional" TGY) is pretty heavy-fire - Chaozhou style. Finding a good medium oxidation, medium fire TGY is even harder than finding a good high-fire tea. And from what little I've been able to tell (both in terms of what's available on the market, as well as what I've seen in online forums), the demand for traditional TGY in the mainland is not high at all, compared to the demand for modern style.

Think of it in economic terms too... the modern style of production has less risk of messing up the tea (over-firing it, etc.), and is also in higher demand, and thus can command a higher price on the market. Even the highest priced high-fire TGY I've seen available is roughly $200 US / jin, and so much cheaper than the highest grade greener ones.

[gingkoseto]

This is still to be tested, but I hypothesize that charcoal roast (or machine roast) oolong is likely to be favored more in western market than greener oolong (due to the amount of black tea lover, diet preferences of the westerners...), green tea and probably even black tea.

But I also believe there is a problem in Chinese tea export (or Chinese tea import in western countries). The cheapest teas get to be exported and imported. Those teas drinkers potentially like the most don't. So basically the biggest exporters and importers decide what maximize their profits, and tea drinkers are not in their consideration.

If there is more export/import of good traditional teas to the western market, probably it won't be that expensive, and good tea manufacturers in China are more rewarded by the international market. However, I have no idea how this can be achieved.

As I read about Chinese tea export in 2009, 30k tons of tea (final products, not raw products) was exported for a total sale of $70 million, that's about $2300 per ton, or $2.3 per kg, or $1 per pound. Among them I guess gunpowder belongs to the higher end group. We can imagine what kind of tea export/import it is. Or probably we can't imagine

[Tead Off]

While it's true that commercial tea enterprising will always out trumph the artisan/handmade teas as far as popularity and production/quantity, I am sure there is a strong enough demand from the seasoned tea drinkers in China alone to keep alive and continue high quality tea production, especially traditional TGY. Combine this with the willingness and ability of the newly rich and informed tea drinker to pay higher prices for better quality teas. Most tea drinkers won't pay the high prices that the great teas demand. Those high prices are the rewards for the tea makers who continue to produce quality. Plus, the American mindset and market cannot rival the Asian high end when it comes to spending money for quality. A simple example of this was just had in Hong Kong. A client took me out for dinner in an Italian restaurant. It was a nice place, not super luxurious, and, the food was very good. The average pasta cost US$35. I'm not used to paying this kind of price and believe me, we have some great Italian restaurants here in Bangkok. But, my client simply said to me, this is normal pricing.
So, I can walk down the street to the Italian 'chain' restaurant and eat much cheaper but usually the quality will not be the same. The good teas will continue to be made but the prices will continue to escalate. For me, the best value in tea is from Darjeeling. The prices are still very low for some great teas, but, they are not traditional TGY's. Alas.

[northerncalifornia]

I don't believe the art of traditional TGY making is being lost. As the customer base for high end TGY dramatically expands in past 10 years in China, tea masters have put extra care and energy into making better tea. Actually more higher end TGY tea are being produced because there is a market for it. If you travel in China, you will find that TGY is in every tea house's menu and some high end restaurant's menu as well.

Higher demand leads to higher prices. Higher prices in turn lead to higher demand for more skilled tea masters and higher compensation.
As the reward goes up, more people will choose to stay in their village instead of going to big cities. I actually met several young people
in Anxi villages who left for big cities but went back home. It will still take a lot of practices and trainings for them to become great tea making
masters. But at least some of young people are starting in that journey.

As for light roast vs dark roast TGY, I believe the demand for dark roast TGY has gone up compared to 2-3 years ago.

[gingkoseto]

Although I like both traditional green style and traditional charcoal roast a lot more than modern green style, I don't think modern style is inferior to traditional style. In market, traditional style is not more expensive than modern style, just rare. If someday traditional style can be made more, I think it's possible for it to have lower average market price than modern style.

Modern Fujian TGY is largely influenced by Taiwan high mountain oolong, both were greatly encouraged by Japanese market when they first came out, and then TGY was well received by many traditional green tea drinking regions in China. Modern style has its drawbacks, but it also has its great characters that enabled it to dominate the market.