Why I discontinued Huang Zhi Xiang Phoenix Mountain Oolong
To the tea community,
I recently noticed that a tea I used to sell was being passed around in a Traveling Tea Box. The only experience I’ve had with TTB’s as being asked to donate some tea for one that was going around. I was told that it’s a great way to gain exposure because the box was made for customers that want to try teas from different companies to find tea that they may potentially want to purchase. That being my only experience with TTB’s, I assumed that finding new teas to purchase was the main reason behind them.
I had discontinued this tea because it hadn’t been tested for pesticide residue. The tea was a great tea, one that I still enjoy on occasion, but it was not worth having it tested when there are better teas that I can source that are certified pesticide free.
Because this tea did not meet my current standards for quality, I sent a message to the person that posted the tasting note asking if they would remove it from the box. I figured that would be the best way to keep reviews consistent with my standards and new customers drinking tea that I truly and fully stand behind.
I admit, I did not think about the fact that someone had bought the tea from me and added that into the box to share. I made a promise to myself years ago to never do anything for the money. As the one and only person running my business, I tend to completely forget about the money aspect of my company. This allows me to love what I do and truly go into it with the passion and moral standards that I live by. It also becomes a flaw sometimes, as I do forget that at one point or another, someone had to work hard to experience the things I live to share.
Previously, when I sold this tea, I had great standards for quality. I am always striving to enhance the tea experience by narrowing my focus to only the best teas I can find. The tea in question is definitely safe to drink. I was merely being overly cautious and trying to keep the Whispering Pines tea experience consistent with my current quality standards.
It was suggested that I issue a recall for all those who bought this tea. I wouldn’t go as far as to recall this tea. Again, I still drink it because it’s a fantastic tea, and when I offered it tea, my standards were already exceedingly high.
My standards have grown. I constantly try to better my business and provide complete transparency. Honesty and quality are the building blocks for my company, and I run my business by my moral standards. I am a man of great integrity, and I assure you that I meant nothing bad by my actions.
I am more than willing to replace the teas that were taken out of this box with teas that I fully stand behind, as well as to send replacement tea to the person that originally purchased it from me.
I’ve written this because the situation quickly escalated and I wanted to clarify my motives. If I had known that the TTB was simply for people to try tea, I likely wouldn’t have said anything. The tea in question is actually very well-liked and has great reviews, so this was not about preventing low ratings, but about my moral obligation to be honest and transparent about the fractional possibility that the tea may contain pesticides.
The vast majority of tea on the market contains pesticides in levels that make them unsafe for human consumption. The tea I asked to be removed absolutely does NOT fall under that category, but I still suggested it be removed because I couldn’t absolutely 100% verify that it was completely clean.
I hope this sheds more light on the reasoning behind my actions. If you have any comments or questions, please add them here. I would like to make sure that my reasoning is clear and that I do all I can to ensure this doesn’t happen again.
Cheers,
Brenden Gebhart
Owner and Tea Mixologist
Whispering Pines Tea Co.
Link to the original discussion: http://steepster.com/Dexter/posts/282290#comments
I also put this post on the website for those not on Steepster to see:
http://whisperingpinestea.com/blog/?p=90
Hi Brenden,
First of all, I want to say thank you for posting a thread on this topic, and also for posting it on your site.
I am the curator/owner (if that if what its called) of the TTB in question. You had sent a PM to one of the members of this TTB asking for two Whispering Pines teas to be removed from the box – as you stated above. This member and myself had a short discussion on whether or not we should remove these teas. In the end we decided to respect your wishes. For the purpose of transparency,a post was then made on the TTB thread notifying all participants what had happened.
There was quite a bit of discussion about this situation, some of it not very positive. And I totally understand why there was upset over this. I was not aware that your request to remove the teas was only made to the TTB and not made to the general public/steepster community/WP customers, etc. After the fact,the request did appear to be quite discriminatory.
In my opinion, (I do not represent the members of the TTB), I think the biggest concern was the lack of transparency. It appeared that you were concerned about potential new customers and not of current, paying customers.
Thank you for posting this for clarification. I hope there is some positive that can come from this. You obviously are concerned about selling high quality, safe tea. That is very important in this industry.
Note: I’m cross-posting this in the other thread.
I am seldom, if ever, accused of being the voice of reason. I’ve been reading the threads on the Great Whispering Pines Debacle 2015. I’m dismayed by what this turned into. I am passionate and opinionated and the first to jump in when I think something is WRONG. But I’ve also defended other tea companies when I felt like things were going a bit far – in one case, a Steepsterite making accusations of deception on shipping policies to another country when it was clearly NOT deception by another of my favorite tea companies and another case when a new-to-Steepster tea company who has great tea posted reviews of their own tea, promoting it without understanding the way things worked. In both of those cases, I did not believe (and still don’t) that they were intentional abuses of the tea buying public. I chose the path of understanding and benefit of the doubt.
I most emphatically don’t believe that is the case here either. As has been repeated, well, um repeatedly, there isn’t any indication there is pesticide in the tea. And he found better tea so he quit selling it. As he noted – HE STILL DRINKS IT. I don’t think there is anything wrong with the tea. He never one time said there is pesticide in the tea. He said he couldn’t confirm the origins and never had it tested. This is someone who is picky about what he puts in his body almost to the point of religion and HE STILL DRINKS IT.
But he screwed up. He did some things wrong. He handled this clumsily and dug himself a hole that will be hard to get out of. And that is unfortunate. We aren’t talking about a multi-national corporation here with handlers and PR people. We are talking about 24 year old PASSIONATE tea lover with rigorously high standards who made a mistake in the way he handled those standards. Someone who keeps looking for better and better and better tea. Someone who cares about the PEOPLE who drink his tea to the point that he posted this on Facebook on New Years Day:
Happy New Year! As a thank you to all of you and a way to start fresh, I’m taking my list of customers that owe money and tearing it into pieces. You all get a fresh start! Hope 2015 feels as good to you as it does to me! Cheers.
And he was caring for people when he saw the tea in the tea box – the tea isn’t noxious poison that will affect chromosomes and your children will be born looking like the three-eyed fish on The Simpsons. But he has ridiculously, and almost unattainably high standards. He keeps looking for better. And I like being able to buy better. But he made a mistake in the way he handled it and the way he phrased it and apparently no amount of explaining will satisfy some. Unprofessional? I guess, in one sense of the word. In the sense that he isn’t slick and polished always knows exactly the right thing to say or do every single time. Clearly he doesn’t. And I’m guessing he’s mortified that above all else that he made Dexter feel badly.
I will continue to drink it because I’m freaking PICKY. And I will I drink a lot of Whispering Pines tea. A lot. Because I trust it. I trust Brenden and I’ve seen how much he CARES. It’s easy for things to escalate on the internet. We see it time and time again. When I look at the level of civility over the recent Steepster issues despite MASSIVE frustration, I find it hard to believe I’m on the same site today. I think everyone deserves a chance to rectify mistakes – most especially when they are mistakes that come from the place of trying to do good – no matter how clumsy and awkward.
I’m already well beyond the TL; DR point, so I will shut up now.
+1 this (I have nothing relevant to add other than support…that keeps happening with your comments :P )
I agree! I was appalled by the way things had escalated on that thread. Brendan at Whispering Pines has the one of highest standards I have ever encountered in a tea company. I am sure that everyone has had tea that was suspect.. just think of all the low-grade teabags and indiscernible loose blends by huge conglomerates we all started out on.
WP and several other companies have pushed me to be a better and smarter tea drinker. The fact that all those angry words got pushed around for essentially nothing is disheartening. People make mistakes, I cannot stress that enough. But people are not the mistakes they have made. I hope we can all move on and be agreeable to everyone who chooses to visit and participate on this site.
This is what I was trying to say. Well put and thank you for posting MsPriss!
Missy, Thank you for investing yourself in this very well articulated reply. I second everything you said.
@blodeuyn, you rock!!
@TheLastDodo, I love what you wrote and agree 100%
Make that a +4 with MzPriss! That was an excellent post.
Though I wanted to say to Brendan,
It’s one of the hardest things in the world to try to be honest and transparent. Doesn’t always go perfectly, like this time, but you know, it’s really nice to see someone trying to be that in the world. Definitely doesn’t always go right or well, but just knowing that someone is that dedicated to his passion and his customers is enough for me. Whenever you speak up about a concern in a small company, it’s a big risk. And since you took it, I think it says a lot about your character, and I think in that aspect it should be admired that you really do care enough to think of these things and all. Didn’t really handle it the best way, but you just gotta live and learn, right?
And everyone does make mistakes, pshh if any of us owned a tea company, I know we’d make just as many, if not more for some of us. I’m sorry that this situation blew up and that some Steepster members felt personally hurt by all this. :( I know that you never intended this, and I know you’re doing your best to make it right-which I admire.
So, I for one still hold WP in respect, and will continue purchasing from there.
It is an interesting world we live in, where seeking ever-higher quality (and in this case, much higher than average) can conflict with the norm so much to lead to confusion and suspicion. I haven’t received my teas from you yet, but based on what I’ve read on your site, and what you have posted here, your company has a philosophy that seems very unique. I have only read the outcome of this situation, but it seems like a legitimate misunderstanding and learning experience. It can be hard when few companies are as firm in their philosophies and ethics as you clearly are, so when even small errors are made it can be hard to give the benefit of the doubt. Personally, as a general rule, I try to judge how people (or businesses) handle themselves when there is an error or crisis, and not for the error itself as errors are truly inevitable. So far you seem to be dealing with everything directly, promptly, and honestly. Frankly, for me, that makes me respect you and what you have built even more, and I am even more excited as a new customer. :)
And a +1 here. I’m new to this site, and currently over my budget (big surprise!) – but I will be adding WP to the list of companies to try. This seems to me like a business owner trying hard to do the right thing, perhaps not communicating as clearly as he’d hoped, and then getting “burned” for trying to do the right thing. It sounds to me as if he thinks the tea is probably just fine (after all, he drinks it!), but he can’t cross his heart and promise that it is.
I have been an WP customer for a longgg time, I remember the first order I got, with a handwritten note. I was pretty new to tea, and this little note sticks with me to this day. This is the type of person and company Brenden/Whispering Pines is – honest, polite, and ever grateful for the chance to share amazing tea with others. Just read his policies on his website – he is a vendor that strives for the best of the best and is as honest as he can be with his teas. This incident seems to have escalated into an unfortunate communication with words, and yes, it could have been handled better and differently. I can see how it could have been taken the wrong way. But people make mistakes. It happens. It’s a learning experience for all. I personally believe he has the best intentions for his customers, and the fact that he posted this thread fully explaining himself helps to verify this. The fact he is this concerned about the quality of tea that his customers consume in the first place is a wonderful characteristic in a tea vendor!
So in conclusion, I will still be a loyal WP customer. Not only because he runs a great company (please, read the policies on his website and you will see what I mean), but also because I trust in this vendor. He definitely has high standards for his tea, and you can tell when you taste them!
Hopefully I don’t get torn apart on here, I generally don’t like posting to touchy subjects, but I felt the need to voice my opinion. Hopefully no hard feelings!
+1 to MzPriss as well! She summed it up better than me I think :)
Note: I’m also crossed-posting this in the other thread
http://steepster.com/Dexter/posts/282290#comments
I’ve been a member here for four years…I’d like to think I have acquired a certain credibility over the years.
I’ve seen lots of companies come and go. Only a few have earned my business.
Whispering Pines is one of them. Full proof. I KNOW Brenden, I TRUST him. I’ve been his client for a while now, and BECAUSE he so transparent and has so much integrity, it’s pretty easy for me to know that he meant well.
The commotion about this whole thing doesn’t worry me. Brenden is respected and loved here for many good reasons. He built his reputation step by step… he has and he’s still learning from his mistakes cause he’s humble enough to admit to them. You don’t get as solid as he is now by bullshitting people.
Some of the comments I read were hurtful and without substance and although everyone is entitled to speak their mind, some were just so harsh. I say “some” cause other comments were brought up as genuine concern. (Dexter, I know you and understand your initial preoccupation and where it came from).
See, most companies wont even tell you how they source their teas, and certainly wont guarantee they are pesticide free. I could name a list of those companies, VERY popular ones. People still drink them without knowing. The fact that Brenden attempted at doing so, even if there may be NOTHING WRONG AT ALL with that tea, gets my applauds. Now HOW it was done, well yeah…what MzPriss said. I wont reiterate what she already expressed so well.
But I will take a stand and support him without hesitation. Cause I CARE about him and his company, yes, but mostly because I know HE cares about his product and about his CLIENTS. If I wasn’t 100% sure of that, I would not even get involved.
Bashing is disgraceful. Steepster is a place where the drama is kept at a minimum. That’s why it’s the only online forum I participate in. Thank you Blodeuyn for reminding us of that.
Cheers and peace good Steepster people.
Here’s the thing, folks. WP wasn’t transparent about this at all until they were called out on it. I will admit, I have never purchased from WP and while I’ve seen them around the discussion boards, I’ve never interacted with them. So while many of you have warm fuzzy memories of this company, I don’t. This is my first true exposure to them and it wasn’t a good one. I’m sorry but when a small company screws up, they need to be held just as accountable as the big guys. That seems to be seen as “bashing”, though, not just sweeping their mistakes under a rug and instead asking them to deal with it.
And still nothing has been dealt with. Great, they’re willing to replace the tea from the TTB. What about the other customers? To me, and I know I’m in the minority here, this still just seems shady. A few days ago, these teas were to be removed from the TTB. Today they’re perfectly safe, which seems to be the sentiment expressed since a recall was mentioned. It just doesn’t seem right.
A few quotes:
“I figured that would be the best way to keep reviews consistent with my standards and new customers drinking tea that I truly and fully stand behind.”
So they asked that the tea be removed to avoid bad reviews.
“I admit, I did not think about the fact that someone had bought the tea from me and added that into the box to share.”
This whole paragraph is bull, in no way sounds to me like someone who cares about his clients. Money is what makes the world go round and the company would not exist without customers like Dexter. If they truly did not even think of that, then they need to shift their priorities a little to focus on the customer. The customer isn’t always right, but geez, they need to at least exist.
“If I had known that the TTB was simply for people to try tea, I likely wouldn’t have said anything. The tea in question is actually very well-liked and has great reviews, so this was not about preventing low ratings, but about my moral obligation to be honest and transparent about the fractional possibility that the tea may contain pesticides.”
This is a straight up contradiction and one of my biggest issues with the note. If they had known the tea was not meant to bring in new customers, they would not have mentioned that they could not verify the cleanliness of the tea.
“The vast majority of tea on the market contains pesticides in levels that make them unsafe for human consumption.”
You can’t say things like this without backing them up with legitimate sources. I can sit here and say that most unicorns are pink in color, but unless I have legitimate scholarly articles on the color of unicorns, I’m just talking out my ass. With the push towards all things organic (and the number of people who drink a ton of tea a day and don’t get sick) I’m going to lean towards this is untrue and only said to make WP teas look better. I’m sure articles can be found to back up this claim, but in today’s world, stats can be found to back up anything.
I know I’ll be corrected several times over this note, and I know I’ll be accused of bashing once again, but it is what it is. The note here from WP felt like a whole lot of double talk. At the end of the day, WP sold tea they could not verify was clean and then tried to cover it up. You don’t have to like me or the things I say and you can praise poor, poor WP all you like, but the facts don’t change. They sold potentially unclean tea, tried to hide that fact, and only became “transparent” when called out.
WP, I do hope this has been a major learning experience for you and that while money may not matter to you, customers need to. Keep better customer records and next time there is a mistake, be actually transparent about it and not just when someone calls you on it.
And, for the record, I’ve been a member here for four years too. So how about my credibility, hmm?
I think your criticism is valid to a point. Brenden clearly could have handled the situation with his uncertifiable teas better, and I agree that companies regardless of size should be held accountable when they screw up, but I think we need to have some perspective here. From what I gather, it’s a one-man operation that’s only existed for about two years. (and is he really only 24? dang.) There’s no customer service team with trained specialists like Harney & Sons might have (please correct me if H&S doesn’t). And while it might be “shady”, it really doesn’t seem to me like enough of an issue to swear off ordering from WP. It’s not like he’s selling poison tea, even if he did kind of make it sound like it.
But he’s not being held accountable. There’s not a call for him to properly report this to the customers who paid good money for the tea that they may no longer wish to drink, due to recent findings coming to light. He’s tossing a bit of tea at the TTB and Dexter and that’s it. The responsible thing to do, since he can’t seem to find his customer records (which is poor practice in and if itself), would be to send out a mass e-mail to all of his customers, state what happened, and offer an exchange or credit to those who have receipts and wish to do so. It doesn’t take any special training to know that saying “I messed up, I’m sorry” wins you a lot more respect than trying to sweep it under the rug. Yes, he would lose some customers, but he would also gain some. I know I’ve ordered from companies because of their customer service when an issue arises. No, he may not have the resources of DavidsTea or Harney & Sons to offer recalls, but an effort should be made to make it right. And it should have been made when he discontinued the teas due to quality issues, not now, after it’s all come to light.
That’s just my opinion and I know many disagree with it. But I have to wonder, the next time an issue like this comes up, how will it be handled? If there was an issue with my order, would any steps be made to correct it? Or, like this issue, would it be ignored until I made a big deal out of it? Customer Service can make or break a company and it sounds like WP needs to invest some time and energy into improving his.
I second this post, and thank you aisling of tea for this well thought out reponse. It shouldn’t be concerned bashing when you are trying to look at this issue logically…
I’m not saying Brenden is a bad person, and I know Whispering Pines provides high quality teas as I have made a few purchases from them, but this situation was handled poorly, and it’s getting muddled now.
Whether this tea (and the Yunnan Dian Hong: Classic 58) has pesticides or not doesn’t concern me because it doesn’t seem to be the real issue. If it were actually a health issue with the pesticides, he should be responsible for alerting EVERYONE who purchased it – but he isn’t worried about that. He says he drinks the tea and has no worries abut health risks, and isn’t worried about anyone who purchased it.
What does concern me is that he wanted these teas removed from this ONE box because he didn’t think it fit his high standards and it seems like he didn’t want customers to drink it and post bad reviews of it. And now the pesticide concern is brought up to cover this up.
“I figured that would be the best way to keep reviews consistent with my standards and new customers drinking tea that I truly and fully stand behind.” - So you sold this tea, but no longer stand behind it. That’s fine that you want to hone your craft and provide better tea, but you still sold this tea, and you can’t cover it up.
This just comes across as an attempt to manipulate/avoid bad reviews of a tea WP is no longer happy about – but what does it matter if it’s discontinued? Many great tea companies have teas that are rated really high, with a few that are rated lower. It’s supposed to be a spectrum because everyone has different tastes and enjoys different aspects of tea.
Letting the teas stay in the box (even if the ppl trying it can’t reorder it from WP) would still have allowed people to get an idea about what Yunnan Dian Hong and Phoenix Mountain Oolongs taste like. Instead it was wasted, and for no real reason except to protect a few ratings on teas that aren’t for sale anymore.
____
I’m also a little wigged out that the vendors are paying that much attention to everything on steepster that they would know what was even in the TTB, even though (as far as I could see?) the list of teas wasn’t posted anywhere. I already feel a little pressured when I post reviews for companies that I know are active on the site because sometimes they’ll jump on your post immediately and ask questions about why it was just ok instead of great etc… Are we going to see this behaviour in our tea swap threads now too? (No, you can’t swap this tea because I don’t want people to drink it anymore?)
Like Anna said on Dexter’s review, anything negative said about small companies seems to be seen as bashing, which is why I just don’t talk about 52teas any more. And it seems that WP is falling under that umbrella too, nothing bad can be said about the poor little company. They’re a company and they have a responsibility to their customer. Period, end of story, no ifs, ands, or buts.
Thank you for commenting, Cavocorax, I was starting to worry that I was losing my mind!
I do hope you’re not including me in your snarky “nothing bad can be said about the poor little company” comment. I said that I do understand your reasoning and empathize with your concerns, but it seems like a fairly minor issue (even compared with other small businesses) with a solution that may not be so readily obvious to a novice business owner, that was exacerbated by inexperience and clumsy handling. All I was saying is that WP seems to want to make this situation right, and that a single misstep from a company of that size and age probably shouldn’t elicit the same reaction as a brand with national presence like DT.
That said, worrying about the ratings of a product that you no longer sell does strike me as quite silly, especially when you have so many others on the site’s top 20 teas. And declaring the “vast majority of tea on the market” to be “unsafe for human consumption” is a pretty brash statement to make. We know you care about health and pesticides, Brenden, but things like this aren’t necessary.
Why do you keep referring to the tea as unclean? Is it because the tea contained any amount of pesticide? Most teas do contain trace amounts of pesticide. Here is an article on the subject:
And although I couldn’t find stats from last year it is true that in the past tea has been one of the top violative products in the FDA’s Pesticide Residue Monitoring Program.
Brenden stated that the tea was safe to drink, it just didn’t meet his standards anymore. He never said the tea was unclean or unsafe.
By offering to replace the tea with one that he knows is pesticide free he is offering something that most tea companies don’t. He was asking that a perfectly safe tea be taken out of the box so he could replace it with something that was superior and meets his exceedingly high standards because that’s what he wanted anyone who was trying his teas for the first time to experience, the very best he had to offer.
From what I can see that is far above what most other tea companies will ever offer.
Edit: Questionable links removed.
Veronica, thank you for the links. Just a note, though: sites like Foodbabe and Collective-Evolution are known for relying on pseudoscience to make their points, and several of Foodbabe’s posts have been discredited by actual scientists. A naturopath is probably not a very reliable source either, especially when they nick charts from Foodbabe.
@adagio breeze – Fair point. I removed them to try to keep this as civil a conversation as possible.
Aisling of tea – I didn’t want you to think you were alone in voicing your concerns!
Veronica – he wasn’t originally asking to replace it. He just wanted it gone. He only thought to replace it after people started to make a fuss about why it was pulled. He’s only looking to replace the tea in the box, and not the tea that anyone else might currently still have in their cupboard. It seems like he’s worrying too much about image and ratings, and getting involved when he should just let people swap teas in peace. It would have been far better for him to leave it alone in the first place.
Adagio breeze – thank you for discrediting foodbabe. I’m so sick of that link floating around everywhere I look! <3
@adagio – Nope, I wasn’t including you in my “snarky comment”, though I was trying to avoid naming names.
@Veronica – Correct me if I’m wrong (and I’m sure many will), but does pesticide residue = unclean? I know that if I buy an apple from the supermarket, it is unclean until I wash it to remove pesticide residue. So doesn’t it stand to reason that tea that has possible pesticide residue is, well, possibly unclean?
And, well, I call it possibly unclean because…because WP does?
“This has nothing to do with it being dangerous, but rather that it’s not worth it to verify that it’s completely clean when there are other sources for me to get better tea that has been verified.”
Cannot verify that it’s completely clean = possibly unclean. So, yeah, he kinda did say that the tea could be unclean.
(quote from here: http://steepster.com/Dexter/posts/282290#comments)
And, for the record, he offered to replace one person’s tea. Surely Dexter is not the only person to have purchased said tea?
(And, also for the record this is me being snarky)
You can find links and information to back up any claim. Also, blog posts by doctor Oz wannabes don’t count as scholarly articles.
Edit: Pink Unicorn links removed as well
@aisling of tea – I never referred to you as snarky, and I removed any questionable links, so I do not understand your last comment unless you find the FDA on par with Dr. Oz.
“By offering to replace the tea with one that he knows is pesticide free he is offering something that most tea companies don’t. He was asking that a perfectly safe tea be taken out of the box so he could replace it with something that was superior and meets his exceedingly high standards because that’s what he wanted anyone who was trying his teas for the first time to experience, the very best he had to offer.”
I’m trying to stay out of this because I’m still very angry, and I don’t want to fly off the handle with emotion but it seems there is lots of defense coming from emotion….
In response to the above statement this is what I would to know:
a> when he asked it to be pulled? Did he offer to replace it? I’m not even sure what was in the message to Ubacat but whatever it was made them think there was a problem with it. Obviously Lala thought there was a problem (based on her comments above). What was said in that initial message? I don’t know but they took it serious enough that they pulled the tea. He put both of them in an awkward position. There was nothing in the initial post that indicated it had been offered to be replaced.
B> When I emailed him yesterday morning expressing my concern he didn’t offer to replace it, in fact I just got a three line email that oozed brush off. I did not get anything like the explanation that was expressed in the topic post. My email did not make me feel like he was concerned about me as a customer.
C> I have not been contacted with an offer of replacement – Lala have you been contacted? I feel it wasn’t until the backlash happened that the offer was made, and then (for me anyway) there hasn’t been any follow up.
What I still don’t understand is the backtracking. First it was there’s a problem please pull it. Then he posted he’s “95% sure”, then it was – there isn’t a problem, I still drink it. Cavo expressed it really well – her thoughts are how I feel, thank you for posting that.
Honestly – I know lots of tea contain traces of pesticides, for me this isn’t about clean/not clean – might be ok, might not be ok. For ME this is about how I was treated as a customer. The fact that he’s didn’t even think about that he was asking them to throw out tea that a customer had paid for – isn’t caring for your customer. The blow off email was not caring for your customer.
I completely understand that LOTS of people on here LOVE his teas and his company. That’s great. I am not telling anyone who to buy from. who not to buy from. If you have had positive buying experiences from WP then of course you should be continuing to support them.
Personally, this is the second time I’ve been disappointed/upset at the service provided with Whispering Pines tea, and I think I can say that. I won’t be buying from them again based on my experience with the company.
I think people who haven’t experienced the company should know that some people have had good experiences and some people haven’t. That’s transparency to me.
@Veronica – you weren’t the only one I was replying to in my post, dear. And I wrote up my reply before you edited yours.
@Dexter – that’s awful, that you were just brushed off like that and your post is exactly what I’ve been trying to say.
Dexter – Thank you for your response. It makes sense and has given me a lot to think about and more questions to ask.
I’m sorry this has upset you so much. <3
In response to the comments about whether or not replacement tea was offered for the TTB:
I do not have the original message that was sent to Ubacat, nor have I seen it. Based on my discussion with Ubacat, it is my assumption that replacement tea was not offered. It was just a request to remove the tea from the TTB.
After there was some discussion/comments on this topic, that is when I believe the offer to replace the tea in the TTB was made.
I can’t guarantee this is accurate, but it is correct to the best of my knowledge at this time.
P.S. Replacing the tea in the TTB is not really something that concerns me at this point. But I do understand what the relevance is in some of the comments made above.
Yes, thank you Dexter for telling us your experience. It’s made me reconsider my defense of WP, which was based on limited knowledge of the situation.
Veronica, I didn’t mean for you to think the civility of this thread was at stake because of the links you posted. I just wanted to let you know that they’re not especially credible sources.
I have hated being in the centre of all this and all I can say is my sincere apologies to Dexter, Brenden & Lala for the part I have played in all of this.
Please don’t feel bad. I am sorry this has blown up, for everyone involved. But you have nothing to apologize for. You did nothing wrong at all. A request was sent to you, and you asked me. I gave you my opinion on the matter. I was the one to say take it out of the box and post on the thread.
I never imagined this is what would have happened. In hindsight, I should have requested more info from WP as well as input from all members of the box. I am sorry for all the hurt feelings out there, especially for you and Dexter. Please don’t feel bad or responsible :)
Yep – ditto what Lala said. Ubacat this is not your fault.
Lala – hindsight is always 20/20 – I am sure that you and Ubacat did what you felt was best. I’m not upset at either of you at all.
I hope that all of this does not tarnish/effect others experience with this or any other TTB.
I’m sorry to hear about everyone’s experience… but I’ve had nothing but great customer service and tea from Whispering Pines so will continue my patronage and hope others do as well.
Ok. I think this is the last time I going to chime in but from what I get from this discussion is that this started as a misunderstanding on Brendan’s part on what the purpose of a TTB is. He participated in the one recently that offered samples from vendors to introduce people to tea companies. His samples were well received and he mistook the purpose of all boxes as being a way to test teas with an eye to future purchases. He thought he was being proactive by asking to remove a discontinued tea from a different TTB. His mistake was a misunderstanding of what TTB’s are and feeling that he had to offer a reason for removing it ( he no longer carries it and he can’t guarantee it meets his new standards). As far as I’m aware his policy of guaranteeing Minimum pesticide residue standards is fairly new. At the time he sold these teas he seemed to be looking for new and higher quality teas than he carried at the time. Perhaps he worded his request inappropriately or perhaps it has been a game of telephone but this grew to an interpretation that the tea had high pesticide residue. If Brandon had simply requested that the tea be removed because he no longer carried it, he might have been educated on the purpose of the box and the tea would not have been removed.
Yes this was not handled so well. I understand why people feel upset and defensive, but let’s give WP some time to honour the offers he made yesterday and chalk it up to a learning experience, before we condemn him.
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