The speciality tea major Avataa Beverages set up two new price records at the special auction conducted by Coonoor Tea Trade Association (CTTA) on Monday as part of Tea Board’s celebration of International Tea Day (ITD).
All teas offered for this auction were manufactured with the green leaf plucked on May 21.
“The silver needles excel grade of Avataa created a new price record of ₹16,400 a kg and Avataa’s silver needles special grade fetched ₹15,300 a kg”, Ravichandran Broos, General Manager, Paramount Tea Marketing (SI) P Ltd. Who auctioned these teas told
“These are all-time high prices for us surpassing our previous record of ₹11,500 a kg”, G Udayakumar, Director, Avataa Beverages said.
“We produced these grades of white tea with the buds, not leaf, of tea shoots plucked at sunrise on ITD from an exclusive pocket of our Billimalai Tea Estate situated over 6,000 feet above sea level in The Nilgiris”, he said.
“We processed these teas in our specialised machinery without fermentation to retain the natural green colour of the tea leaf and silver colour of the tips”, explained Avataa’s Speciality tea specialist ENR Vejayashekara.
“We plucked the buds using our trained workers as the quality of the buds is essential to produce top quality silver needle teas”, he shared.
“These are high value low volume teas – we used five kg of green buds to produce one kg of white tea”, he noted.
“We bought these two grades at record price because of their distinct quality, attractive aroma, high-keeping strength and outstanding cup quality”, described Rajbir Sharma, Proprietor of Shree Ganesh Tea Trading Company which is celebrating its Silver Jubilee now.
“More importantly, these teas have a shelf life of two-and-a-half years and hence very economical for the discerning tea connoisseurs”, he noted.
“These are exclusive teas not comparable to others in the market here. We bought them for our select traders in Delhi and some upcountry markets”, he said.
“We are in speciality tea trade for long and will support such teas in coming months as well”, he declared.