Dominic T. wrote:
My background in business and logic tend to
overrun my emotional side, I'm slowly changing that and would still
like to do it at some point or in some way...

Dominic, it is a very liberating step if you let your emotional side
reign, but you'd need some backup options. We keep hoping that people
DO care, but it seems that it's not even 1 in 100...

I did some different research projects into it and exactly what you
state is correct. I had tastings and questionaires at a coffee shop,
and the only two teas anyone liked were a strawberry sencha and a
ginger peach black tea. Both flavored teas. Even things like jasmine
were passed over.

Since there is nothing I loathe more than aromatized teas (my homeland
Germany seems to be dominated by this kind of "tea"), we made the
decision to not carry any flavored teas (exceptions are a few
traditional flower-scented chinese teas like high-end Jasmine pearls).
We do have the odd person asking for a lime-sencha, but that happens
rather rarely. I think, the problem is to get people to try something
new (a rather inappropriate term in regards to tea, I know). If they do
try it, they are almost guaranteed to be back. There is a strange
misconception about what tea tastes like. Give them a good pu-erh or
Darjeeling and it blows them away...


I don't want to
do food (beyond basics), and my only other choices so far are an art
gallery or niche book shop/filmhouse with cool indie films.

Like-mindedness? Your paragraph reads like a snapshot of our thoughts.
We don't do food (beyond basics), which is a bit of a problem. And one
of our ideas was to show "cool indie films". I hope you will come to
New Zealand in the near future. I'd love to chat, watch some movies and
drink tea...

I'll send you a private message about our teahouse (remembering the
passionate discussions and flame-wars regarding tea merchants here in
this group last year...).

Jo