Tea & Cards TTB-US & Canada-Round 2: CLOSED

To hopefully fix the bug with not having a reply box available, I’m putting the rest of the initial info in this first reply. Thanks for the tip, Marzipan!

I can’t say how much this will cost to ship – hoping for less than $15, at least within the US. This is open to Canada as well. To manage the shipping costs I ask for one person to volunteer to to spend the extra money to send across the border. Once it goes to Canada, it will stay in Canada until it has made the rounds there. Then I will need one Canadian friend to volunteer to send to the US. This way, the extra cost will not impact everyone, just 2 people who are willing to take it on.

I will put the list of who will be in this second round on this thread once selection is made. Everyone wants to get something out of this and in order to accomplish that I will not be selecting people who are not very active on the board. Being new to Steepster isn’t going to disqualify you, but if you haven’t been posting tea reviews or to discussion threads I’m probably not going to put you on the list. No offense intended to anyone, but everyone needs to be an active participant for this to be successful!

This box can have everything from full ounces, to enough tea for a cup or two or teabags. No tins, please! The teas you include can be anything but please try to send teas that are good quality. This doesn’t necessarily mean expensive, just not things that have lost their flavor from being 4 years old! The idea is to replace an equal amount of tea that you take out but don’t increase the size of the box exponentially just to get rid of stuff you don’t want any more. Try to keep the box about the same size when you send it on. Please PM both me and the person you are sending to when you send the box out but you only need to send the delivery confirmation to the person you are sending the box to (Do NOT post it in this thread, due to privacy issues).

RULES:

+The teabox will travel within the US & Canada. You must mail with the delivery confirmation option! Post updates on the box in this thread. Please add an equal amount of tea that you remove. If you wish to include on this thread what you take out and what you put in, feel free to do so, but it is not necessary.

+ Please send the delivery confirmation number to the person to whom you are mailing the box. Please do NOT post in this thread with the delivery confirmation number due to privacy issues and your location being made public.

+ When you get the box, take out whatever card is included and put in your own card. Sample or decide what teas you want to remove to sample and replace them with the teas you are sending on. Please only keep the teabox for ONE WEEK at most. That should be plenty of time sample some and make a decisions about what else to keep to try and what to put back in, but not too long that it is held up! Let me know if something comes up before the box gets to you and I can move you in the list – like if you are going to be on vacation or out of town when it is your turn to get the box.

+ Please make sure you are following at least a couple people after you and before you on the mailing list so you can give your address, get the next address and in case the next person doesn’t respond. Also, ask for the next person’s address as soon as you get the teabox. Check to make sure the next person is ready to get the box shortly before you mail it out because something may have changed – maybe they moved or are out of town or indisposed. If you do not get a response from the person after you on the list within 3 days, move on to the next person, making sure to let me and the person you are skipping know they are being skipped. If you cannot send a PM to the person next on the list because they are not following you, let me know. I will be following everyone on the list and you must follow me after being added or I will remove you from the list and add someone else.

+Make sure each tea name and brand is labeled. It would also be a nice addition to list the recommended steep time and temp as well as your Steepster name. If the tea is something that isn’t found on Steepster already, please include ingredients if you know them. There were a couple of teas in the first round box without brand names on them. Please be sure to do at least have the tea name and brand name. Having something labeled just “Earl Grey” isn’t going to help someone find out where to get more of it if they love it.

+If you put in strong smelling teas, you must double bag them and wrap in plastic wrap or foil if possible to keep out any cross contamination of other teas. This is an absolute must. If you are putting in a flavored or scented tea, you must, must, must do this. By the time the first box got back to me, all I could smell from any of the unflavored teas was spice. :) I have initially separated the unflavored blacks by putting them together in their own bag. Same for the greens & whites & spice blends. The flavored teas I am leaving loose in the box. My hope is by further isolating the unflavored/unscented teas and keeping the strongly flavored/scented spice blends isolated from them that the cross contamination can be reduced. So try to keep to this system if you can. If you need to add another bag to fit in more of a type of tea, go for it.

+Please don’t put anything heavy in the box, not even tins. The goal is to share tea, not tins and tins will increase shipping cost.

+It’s also a nice idea to look at the shopping lists of the next couple of members after you on the list, to see if you have any teas they’d like to try!

+Make sure the box isn’t too beat up before you send it to the next person and replace with a new box if necessary. Please do NOT use a USPS priority box to replace the box since that forces the next person in line to use Priority mail as well and that may be cost prohibitive for them.

I have set the order for Canada first since I don’t mind paying the shipping. Dexter3657 offered to pay the other cross border shipping. I tried to take into account when folks said they would be gone but shipping times could mess with that. If it comes up to being your turn and the timing isn’t going to work out, just let me know as soon as you can.

Box order:
whatshesaid
Virginia
Sil
Kat_Maria
Pyroxy
Carol Who
Marzipan
lolainred
Megan
mj
EvaGrimm
jump62359
JennKay

I’ll send the box out as soon as I can this week or next Monday. Since I’m sending cross border, I won’t be able to give an idea of how much it will cost in the US. If when Kat_Maria sends the box on, she’d post the cost here in this thread or PM me, I’ll update and anyone who feels the cost is too much at that point (knowing it will probably go up a few bucks by the end) you can ask to leave the group. Just keep me in the loop and we can make this work! I am revising my initial estimate of US shipping to $15 though, and we should try our best to keep it under that. That means drink that tea and snag lots of samples! Don’t worry about using something up. :)

I would love to participate!

I would love to participate too! I’ve enjoyed watching the last box move around the states. Such cute cards!

I’m in St. Louis, MO.

I really enjoyed the T&C TTB the first round and I would love to participate again. I live in Elgin, IL. These TTBs are totally addicting… getting stuff in the mail… new things… feeling a ‘kinship’ with others in the Steepster community.

ME TOOO PLEASE! (especially since i practically begged nicole to let me play in the next round!) I’m in Toronto, Canada.

I’d be interested in going another round too! I’m in WA :)

I’d love to go another round! I won’t be in the country for basically the month of June, and then I’ll be in CA. If that’s too complicated, I’ll understand and hopefully get in on another round (assuming there is one!).

Love the addition of the postcard! Such a cute idea! I’d be interested in joining. I’m in Tennessee.

I’d love to participate!
I’m in Southern California :)

maybe