Tea and biscuit crisis: why aren't we drinking tea?

Updated
Teapot and cups in kitchen.
Teapot and cups in kitchen.



The British officially love tea. It gets us up in the morning, cheers up a dreary mood, comforts us after a shock and provides endless reasons to get away from work while we wait for the kettle to boil. We love tea so much that we've invented an entire afternoon meal just as an excuse to drink it.

Unfortunately, according to new figures, our love affair with tea is cooling, because we're just not drinking as much of it as we used to.

Mintel has found that tea consumption has fallen from 97 million kilos in 2010 to just 76 million this year - that's a fall of more than 20% over five years. To make matters worse, it reckons it will fall again in the next five years to just 68.7 million kilos.

Why?

The report authors claim that this is largely down to new fashions. We're still boiling as many kettles - it's just that we're making more fruit tea or green tea. It found that between 2012 and 2014 sales of fruit tea rose 31%, while sales of green tea were up 50%.

Meanwhile, when we go out for a hot drink and a chat, we're increasingly likely to pop to a coffee shop, where tea is something of an also-ran. Oddly, we're not consuming more coffee as a result - we're just drinking more of our daily quota on the high street.

The firm added that partly as a result of our move away from tea, and partly as a result of our enthusiasm for cutting down on sugar, we're cutting down on biscuits too. Sales fell from 451 million kilos in 2009 to 413 million kilos last year.

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Don't panic

The good news is that while the tea market is shrinking, it was pretty enormous in the first place. As a result, it still has a place in the hearts of millions of Brits.

The researchers said that 76% of people drink tea every month and more than 50% of people drink it every day. The tea market is still worth an impressive £654 million - which doesn't sound like an industry on the verge of collapse.

A survey last month by International Currency Exchange discovered that tea bags were the most vital holiday essential - packed by a third of people, and ranked ahead of the need to take local currency when we go away.

So it seems that for now, the tea business may survive. But just to be on the safe side, it might be worth popping the kettle on.

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