Tea Ratings/Tastings Score - Is Value part of the consideration?

The number is relative. If you think a tea has better value and that’s why you rated it as much, that’s ok. I think taste is the biggest/most important factor, but if you felt a tea was meh when you were expecting it to be excellent for that price, definitely mention it in the review. I personally rarely factor in cost, but I do hold my expensive teas to a higher standard.

I rate the tea on taste alone, but my recommendation includes price. I will often say that I don’t think the tea is worth the price or say I think it’s a great value. Otherwise it could get complicated, because prices change.

Steepster ratings are very subjective. I base mine mostly on taste but value can sometimes be a factor, albeit a small one. For example, I might knock a few extra points off the rating of an expensive tea that’s sub-standard.

Dr Jim – that’s a solid point about price being variable, even for the same tea.
This issue of vale comes up a lot in online ratings. I’ve seen “would be 4 stars, but way to expensive at $50, so 3 stars” on an amazon review, where the company listened, and dropped the price to $30. It doesn’t really seem fair in that case.
Wine reviewers have taken note. Using an “objective” scoring that doesn’t take price into account can be helpful. I know most 90+ are going to be more expensive than 80+. “The Drunkards Walk” – a great book – talks about how you can get the best value wine by focusing on 85-89. The margin for error means you might be getting a 90+ wine for a 80+ price.
Yelp users, however, almost always accounts for price in reviews. I find this to be really helpful, but it’s also more stable. A cheap slice of pizza vs a 5 course meal are going to have very different prices, and I expect that. I’m not going to hold my neighborhood restaurant to the same standards as Chez La Luxe Chic. I’m also not going to enjoy that 90+ bottle of wine less just because they put a 300% mark up on it.
This is my long winded way of saying – always listen to your Dr… Jim
I will not be accounting for price in my ratings, but will in my recommendations.

I’d say one thing to factor in is whether the two teas you’re comparing are indeed on even keel. For example, do they come from the same region/province? Do they have the same plucking standard? Do they have varying harvest times or processing? In terms of value, I factor in taste but I don’t consider it to be the only way of determining the value of that tea. This is mainly due to the fickleness and subjectivity of taste. I can taste, for example, a decent enough yellow tea that I know may not adhere to the way in which this category of tea gets processed. That having been said, the tea may still taste good! So it depends on whether you’re judging it by taste alone or whether you’re seeking to qualify these sorts of judgments from more “objective” standards. Price, to me, isn’t a fair judgment because plenty of tea that claims to be premium or specialty tea is commodity tea. The tea industry is not really monitored in this sense and big companies are determining price without regulated standards. Wine and coffee, on the other hand, have these sorts of measures in place and thus price is a little more trustworthy as a factor into value.

Perhaps value should be a consideration in tea rating but it is not usually counted. If value were taken into account then a company like Simpson and Vail would have better ratings than Whispering Pines for they are a much better value. Their tea is not quite as good though. But it is a good value and still good quality.