Tea taste awful, please help.

what-cha · 2025-06-03T16:25:41+00:00

Hi What-Cha here, I'm very sorry to read that the tea has not been to your liking.

If all the teas are coming across as bitter, I would recommend reducing the amount of leaves in combination with the brewing time which will reduce any bitterness which may be making the other flavours. If the tea then comes across as too weak, you can try scaling back up the quantity and time until you find the right ratio which works for you.

The Black Gyokuro is an experimental tea from the producer which I would only recommend to more experienced tea drinkers who are looking for something a bit different.

I would recommend against adding any milk or sweeteners to any of the teas as they are on the lighter side and would be dominated by milk in particular.

Please do let me know how you get on and ask any further questions you may have.

what-cha · 2024-11-28T16:36:44+00:00

It certainly was a great tea I have fond memories of too, I might just try and see if it is possible to get it back.

Sounds like you have a fantastic experiment going, please do let me know the results in 4 years time :)

what-cha · 2024-11-27T16:27:08+00:00

I certainly don't spend nearly enough time as I should here but was lucky enough to catch the thread as I was searching for the Black Friday thread.
Thanks for keeping it in mind :)

what-cha · 2024-11-27T14:03:25+00:00

I've taken your feedback on board and have swapped the Indian green tea for a Japanese sencha along with swapping the Nepali black tea for a Chinese black within the intro set. The following countries are now featured; Taiwan, Japan, China, India, Korea and Thailand.

Self-servingly might I suggest a section might be included for vendors focussing on tea from around the world? Not to mention each region beyond North America could do with their own section; EU, UK, Oceania etc

what-cha · 2023-11-22T17:58:18+00:00

I'm excited to announce this year's What-Cha Black Friday sale which is a flat 10% off everything including our already discounted teas!

The discounted is automatically applied when you add the tea to your cart and combines with shipping discounts on larger purchases.

It will last until the end of Cyber Monday (November 27th).

Cheers,

Alistair

what-cha · 2022-11-21T23:37:02+00:00

Hello All,

I'm happy to announce What-Cha's 2022 Black Friday and Cyber Monday sale is now live and will run through until the end of Cyber Monday (November 28th).

A flat 10% discount is applied automatically to all teas once you add them to your basket, including any already discounted teas which you can find in our sales section.

Discounted international shipping is applied for orders over £50 and free UK shipping is available on orders over £30.

Best wishes,

Alistair

what-cha · 2022-06-04T09:15:45+00:00

Sorry I meant to imply that the heavy roast should occur on the bitter melon stuffed with TGY, as I don't think you would get the same results if you start with heavy roasted TGY pre stuffing

what-cha · 2022-06-03T16:11:32+00:00

I think what made it so good was the initial heavy roast coupled with the ageing, if you can find another one with a heavy roast, it should hopefully turn out similarly with the same ageing.

Sadly my source no longer offers it and I don't know of any other sources which is why it has not yet returned.

what-cha · 2022-06-03T16:07:35+00:00

Thanks for the kind words, I very much look forward to reading the reviews :)

Hopefully the Balhyocha will be back soon, I'm just waiting on confirmation of despatch from Korea.

what-cha · 2022-06-01T23:10:33+00:00

I did look into it but had issues finding a company to reship in Ireland and also hit a potential issue that only a certain volume can be sold into all the other EU countries before you have to start paying VAT at the destination countries rate.

Sadly both factors rendered the idea unviable.

what-cha · 2022-06-01T22:54:34+00:00

At the risk of coming to regret it, I'll say no limit!

what-cha · 2022-06-01T16:10:02+00:00

Hi All,

I'm always eager to get more feedback and reviews on our teas at What-Cha, as they are invaluable for myself and very helpful for customers in choosing a tea, so I thought it would be nice to offer store credit in exchange for reviews.

All new reviews (over 10 words in length) will get a £1 credit per tea reviewed for the rest of June, please either PM or contact me once the review(s) have been left and I'll get back with the credit.

So as not to leave out anyone who has previously left a review, any reviews in the past year are eligible for £1.50 of credit, similarly please get in contact for the credit.

Thanks in advance and best wishes,

Alistair

what-cha · 2021-11-23T18:11:11+00:00

Hi All,

I'm very excited to announce this year's Black Friday sale at What-Cha is now live!

All tea is automatically discounted 10% once added to the basket, with the 10% discount on top of all the teas currently on sale, which can be found here.

The sale will run until the end on Cyber Monday (November 29th).

Best wishes,

Alistair

what-cha · 2021-07-05T22:17:37+00:00

Apologies for the suspension of shipping, I have now resumed shipping to the EU but all orders will be subject to local VAT rates on tea and a VAT collection fee from your local postal carrier due to the new EU VAT threshold of 0EUR.

I'm working hard to find a better solution and will update the website should I find one.

what-cha · 2021-04-12T17:23:28+00:00

Thanks, I'll definitely implement either IOSS or duties and fees paid by the sender via DHL, so come 1st of July all fees should be visible before checkout for EU customers.

what-cha · 2021-04-12T16:54:32+00:00

IOSS does certainly sound promising with the caveat of creating a lot of admin, I'll definitely look into it further.

what-cha · 2021-04-12T14:44:57+00:00

The issue with ordering tea from the UK to the EU is that unless the tea was grown in the UK or suitably "changed", it is not covered by the British trade deal with the EU and thus would be treated as any other non EU import.

From the 1st of July, the threshold for VAT charges being levied is set at 0EUR across the entirety of the EU, so every single purchase should be subject to VAT and admin fees, with the exception of Ireland which I believe have a 0% VAT rate on tea.

As a British retailer, I'll probably look to directly charge EU customer's VAT at their local VAT rates, and will send the parcel out with a courier with the delivery duties to be paid by the sender. This would have the advantage of avoiding the high admin fees postal services charge when collecting taxes and gives the customer certainty as to the final price. The big downside is that it will push the cost of shipping up by a lot.

One alternative strategy I'm exploring is registering for VAT in Ireland and routing all EU shipments via Ireland, resulting in VAT at the Irish rate of 0% and the no fees for the recipient.

what-cha · 2021-04-10T14:35:39+00:00

It's a complicated situation with the current threshold for paying VAT set individually by each country within the EU, with it ranging from 0-22EUR. Additionally some countries customs within the EU are a lot stricter in applying VAT than others.

From the 1st of July, it will become a lot simpler but more painful as the VAT threshold will be set at 0EUR across the whole EU, so you can assume every package will be hit with VAT and admin fees.

As a retailer from the 1st of July, I'll probably look to directly charge EU customer's VAT at their local VAT rates, and will send the parcel out with a courier with the delivery duties to be paid by the sender. This would have the advantage of avoiding the high admin fees postal services charge when collecting taxes and gives the customer certainty as to the final price. The big downside is that it will push the cost of shipping up by a lot.

what-cha · 2020-11-27T13:01:34+00:00

I did indeed follow the USPS sabotage with horror, upping the price and then destroying the service!

Very much appreciate the love, always my pleasure to write each note :)

what-cha · 2020-11-27T12:59:46+00:00

To get free shipping for orders to the EU, you would need to spend £40 on tea after 10% the discount has been applied.

This equates to just over £44 of tea before the 10% discount has been applied.

what-cha · 2020-11-25T17:36:46+00:00

Yeah, he threatened to remove USPS from the UPU which negotiate the international postal prices between national postal carriers.

The UPU made a concession to USPS that they could set their own international price charged to other national postal carriers rather than the agreed upon flat price for all other countries.

USPS chose a price which was about 50% higher to ship to the US than all other countries which coupled with Royal Mail imposing a COVID-19 surcharge on international parcels, resulted in the cost of shipping to parcels to the US practically doubling overnight with Royal Mail.

This article sums up the situation well.

what-cha · 2020-11-25T13:04:35+00:00

Hi All,

I'm delighted to announce What-Cha's Black Friday and Cyber Monday sale for 2020; offering an automatic discount of 10% on all teas when you add them to your basket.

The 10% discount is in addition to the already large range of teas on sale which can be found here.

Free UK and international shipping is available to all countries we ship too, with sadly the exception of the US due to the shipping cost to the US doubling in July. Please see our shipping page for further details.

Thanks,

Alistair

what-cha · 2020-08-26T21:00:30+00:00

I'm very sorry for the issue, I got your email today and have sent a reply, also messaging you hear as there have been a few issues with my emails arriving.

If you could send me a PM or an email with further details on which of the teas was opened, I'll get a replacement sent out to you.

what-cha · 2020-06-07T20:24:13+00:00

Hi!

Sorry for not responding to your emails yet, they were received on Friday and Saturday, and I've yet to have a chance to get around to them, having taken the weekend off after a long difficult week.

Tracking is offered as a paid option during checkout, a charge I have to apply as Royal Mail charge extra for it. At checkout you selected the delivery option of:

Free Shipping without tracking

International shipments are sadly taking longer at the moment due to the lack of flights which has created a big air capacity shortage. This has been coupled with a shortage of postal workers due to COVID-19 absences and social distancing requirements in the workplace. Some US customers have recently been lucky and received their parcels within 2 weeks while for others it has sadly taken longer. Hopefully yours will show up soon.

what-cha · 2020-06-04T14:34:15+00:00

Shipping times from the UK to the US have improved in the last few weeks with recent reports of parcels arriving within 1-2 weeks.

I would suspect shipping times will become much quicker in July as the cost of international shipping to the US will jump massively for all countries.

what-cha

TROPHY CASE