Hello, 2022! Welcome to the yearly ritual of the data of the case study of a tea blogger and hoarder.
First off, I started Oolong Owl back in Jan 2012 and this is the 1042 post, holy hoots! Oolong Owl is 10 years old! I’ve busted my owl butt over the years to post every week. If you enjoyed my work and feel festive, I have a Kofi page for tips. 2022 is “renew my domain/hosting for 3 years” so every little bit motivates the tea owls who are peddling the electricity.
Template of my Tea Stash Spreadsheet!
Save a copy and start keeping track of your stash. I highly suggest tracking your tea stash before it gets out of control! Spreadsheets are forever, flexible, and unitaskers – you’ll never be at the mercy of an app or website.
This is the method I use to track my personal tea consumption.
Everything tea that I own is weighed, including samples. I weigh every gram of tea I drink.
Previous Years
2015 | 2016 | 2017 | 2018 | 2019 | 2020
Oolong Owl’s 2021 Tea Stash
New for 2021
- I merged the “teabag” into their respected tea types.
- Renamed the category to Heicha. I should have recoloured it but I was lazy.
- “CS teas” count everything that isn’t herbal. Total tea count includes herbals.
My heicha was previously in the “shou puer” section. This was a good move as I went hard on fu bricks this year. Since 2017, I have been quietly coveting the moldiest of teas, and 2021 dropped an easy source to buy my fav vendor and I bought EVERY one.
I hit the most teas ever this year with 777. I did some winter cleaning in December and purged some older herbals and green oolongs, bringing the number down. It is a repeat of 2020 of an influx of review samples and I’m not finishing things. My white tea stash continues to grow as I don’t even bother trying to finish any samples, squirreling it away for aging.
I was on track to actually reduce my stash by weight. However, in December 2021 I purchased 4 kilos of fu brick. That said, by weight, I added 2 kilos of tea to my stash compared to last year. It is not worth my time to calculate my entire current stash by weight, so the best I can do is track year to year if I’m adding or reducing.
Oolong Owl’s 2021 Tea Spending
Also new for 2021 – I tracked my spending, including “per gram” and per tea type. I never wanted to do it as I truly didn’t want to know, but it wasn’t as bad as I thought it was. That said, I’m not going to reveal too many stats as I also don’t want my family to know how much I spend, hahaha!
Most expensive teas per gram average = $0.68 Sheng Puer, $0.62 Oolong
Cheapest teas per gram average = $0.08 Flavored tea. I had purchased some cheap chais and other black teas for tea lattes.
Most tea type purchased = Heicha and Tea Clubs
2021 I was still feeling the fear of international shipping being slow and painful, so my buying was more local or large international orders but splurging on faster shipping. I went in heavy on Heicha and my oolong purchases were mostly off Floating Leaves Tea’s special reserve. Tea clubs from White2tea and Old Ways Tea also sucked my money and I regret nothing. I initially tried to break down each tea club by gram by type, which didn’t work out well as some teas are worth more than others. In 2022 I’ll start noting the more general price per gram.
Oolong Owl’s 2021 Tea Consumption
Average tea per day = 16 grams
Average tea per month = 485.5 grams
Most teas drank in a month = Tie 531 grams in December 2021 and 529 grams in February 2021 (February had a higher daily average).
Least tea drank in a month = 453 grams, June 2021. Again, June seems like the month I drink the least amount of tea.
Total Tea Consumed = 5827 grams / 5.8 kilos / 12lb & 13.5oz
I drank more than 2020, which was expected as 2021 had less chaotic life things going on. My number is still a pound lower than 2019 & 2018.
2022 Tea Goals and Predictions
More Tea Owls – I get requests frequently for selling more Tea Owls. Other than tea writing, I have been back into my more crafty side designing knit/crochet things, working with my local shops, and making yarn. I’m hoping I can fill my free time making some more tea owls and other interesting items. Sadly, international shipping is still scary (especially EU tariffs) so it will be limited to where these owls can fly to.
When there is a new Tea Owl ready for rehoming, I’ll give my Kofi peeps the first heads up, then social media.
Post Frequency – It seems every tea blogger’s fate is to post less the longer they go on. I have been shifting quality over quantity with more interesting teas than “stuff I agreed to write about.” As usual, I want to do fewer review content but it is also tricky as I got so much tea I want to write about, and topics start to blur with my ghostwriting. Once a week post seems best for me with my current schedule.
