May 2, 1892.1 TffOmbAL AQSieuLTumsT. 
863 
not, Bell in America one ton for each half chest now 
being sold. 
What does it matter to us whether Lipton sells 
his tea as Oeylon pure, or mixed with other teas, 
BO long as he is aljle to place some millions of lb. 
of our staple annually on a now market. 
Does a distiller care whether his whisky is sold 
pure, or blended by the retailer, bo long as he is 
able to dispose of it at profitable rates ? As in 
whisky so in tea, blending often improves both the 
kinds used. 
There has been a vast amount of nonserse talked 
about selling pure Ceylon tea unblended, when 
what we want is a profitable market for it, blended 
or unblended, and our persistent course of re- 
fusing to sell it in America as a blended tea is 
depriving Oeylon of some millions of customere, 
who would gladly do business if we could give 
them a good blend such as can be got in England. 
Apologising for trespassing so much far on your 
space, and trusting the matter may be well ventilated 
during Mr. Lipton's visit to Ceylon, and that some 
good may result, I am, &c., L. D. 
MR. LIPTON ON THE PUSHING OF CEYLON 
TEA IN AMERICA. 
Dambatenne, Haputale, 11th April. 
Dear Sib, — I have today read "L. D."s letter 
with much interest, and although I have never 
written letters to the Press regarding my businees 
or intentions, I have much pleasure in responding 
to the invitation conveyed by your correspondent 
to place my views with regard to the Tea Trade of 
America before your readers. 
The Ceylon American Tea Co. has certainly a 
great work before it, and under the able guidance 
of the Hon. Mr. Grinlinton and his friends ought 
to be of much service to the planters here. I 
must, however, say that the method of advertising 
adopted by the Company has not had the effect of 
making its establishments known outside a very 
few people in New York. For instance, last Sep- 
tember, I, myself, who am deeply interested in all 
matters affecting the tea trade, spent several hours 
in trying to find out where they were located. Of 
course had 1 had their advertisement in my pocket 
I could easily have found their place out. I went 
to the shop they had been in one year previously and 
also to a place in Twenty-third Street where 1 under- 
stood they had been carrying on business since. I got 
several addresses where I was likely to find them, 
but after all had to give up the search. When this 
was my experience, you can imagine what it must 
be for would-be customers who were not sure of 
the address. No doubt there are hundreds of 
tradesmea m New York who would be as difficult 
to find, but for a business to be successful every- 
body should know of its whereabouts. 
Two years ago I had the pleasure of meeting 
Mr. Grinlinton in Chicago, and of showing him 
over nay slaughtering and packing houses, and I 
also met him in New York. It does not require 
mo to state the interest he takes in Ceylon, but 
I cannot refrain from saying here that I never 
met anyone who was so devoted and anxious for 
the success of the Ceylon tea trade than is the 
gentleman who has been unanimously appointed 
Commissioner to represent the interests of the 
Ceylon planters at the ('hioago Exhibition. 
To make a big buoobss of a retail business, it 
Bcarcely matters what value you offer unless it be 
well advertised and conppiouously put before the 
public. If this is not done the chances are the 
Company will only continue to be a " oae-horse 
concern." It would be better for the retail shop- 
keepers, as well as for the planters, that there 
should be more competition in the tea trade in 
America. The more Ceylon tea is advertised and 
the more shops opened for its sale, the more 
talk about it would be caused and a greater de- 
mand for it created. Personally I would much 
prefer that there was more opposition in America 
than there is at the present time. 
I hope to be able to make arrangements to start 
the retail tea business in the United States and 
Canada early next year. I would have been there 
as a tea dealer before now, but I do not wish to 
break up my staff in London in taking over those 
who have ably helped in making my tea business 
what it is until I have completed opening my new 
branches in the United Kingdom. My expecta- 
tion is that by the end of this year I will have 
branches in every town of importance in Great 
Britam from John O'Groat's to Land's End. I 
have already now thirty retail stores in London 
alone, and expect by Christmas to have at least 
fifty. Scotland, I may say, I have finished, and 
England too, with the exception of a few Boutb- 
eastern counties, and Ireland all but two or three 
towns. So that when this work is done I can 
devote my mind and employ my staff in opening 
retail tea shops from the Atlantic (0 the 
Pacific. 
I have already a large provision trade in the U. S. 
over the whole of the country, to meet the 
requirements of which I have to kill in the Chicago 
stock yards several thousand head of hogs daily, 
but this business meantime is entirely wholesale. 
When I put my tea before the American public 
it will be as a retailer. My faith is so 
strong in the future of America as a field for the 
sale of British-grown tea that I mean to erect 
manipulating and distributing warehouses there, the 
same as I have in London. 
From the way tea is handled in America, it ia 
surprising that as much is sold as there is. For 
instance, I saw last autumn in Chicago at the 
door of one of the leading grocers in State Street, 
which is the principal street of the city, tea ex- 
posed to all kinds of weather, just as you would 
see rice or barley at home. When you purchase 
tea in those shops they put it up in a very care- 
less manner, and in a cheaply got-up bag. I asked 
about Ceylon tea in some shops, and they said 
they bad never heard of tea from that place, the 
only kinds you could get, as a rule, being oolongs. 
Japans, common sorts of green tea, and very inferior 
China congou. These teas, if ever they had been 
good, were entirely destroyed by the careless way 
in which they were treated, in adddition to which 
the prices charged were very excessive. This style 
of business does not tend to encourage tea drinking. 
When Americans visit the old country they drink 
as much tea as the English, and the universal 
cry is that they cannot get tea with the same 
flavor at their own homes. I have already regular 
orders for supplying hotels and families with tea 
in the United States; for instance the great Armourof 
Chicago, whose fame is deservedly world-wide, wrote 
to me some two months ago and said : "I consider 
both my own house and those of my children 
are incomplete unless they are well supplied with 
Lipton's teas. We cannot get such teas anywhere 
in our country which will give us anything like 
the same satisfaction." 
I have frequently asserted, and I adhere to my 
formerly expressed intentions, that when I start 
in the tea trade in America, I shall sell a pure 
Ceylon tea, of course, in addition to such blends 
of Ceylon and Indian teas as I may consider advieft. 
' ble. 
