How to Push the Sale of Tea.
To the Editor “Statesman.”
Sir,—Referring to your leader of to-day on the subject of selling Tea at home, I agree with you that Tea-growers should combine for retailing, as they have, through the Syndicate, combined for opening up new markets, but there must be the same spirit of enterprise in the one case as in the other. Now, the mere opening up of shops for the sale of Indian Teas, involving, as it would, rents, expensive establishments, and bad debts, would not afford the necessary scope, nor would it meet the case.
The system of auction in Mincing Lane must with all its drawbacks continue, but it is surely possible to extract some good from it. Let agencies for such a combination as you propose be established in all the large towns in Great Britain, and weekly auctions of packets of Tea from 2 ounces to 5 lbs. or so be held in different parts of each town, so that every day except Sunday there would be an auction going on somewhere. Let the sales be bonâ fide to the highest bidder and for cash on the nail, and I will promise that before a year is over, as high prices will be paid at these auctions as are at present realised by Cooper and Cooper, whilst the demand would soon greatly exceed the supply.
If something of the same kind were done in the bazaars of India, the taste which so decidedly exists among natives would develop rapidly.
Matt. Drews.
Calcutta, January 4th, 1882.
I wrote the following remarks on the above to the same paper:—