Tea companies 'rating' their own teas?
I think it’s great that you who own/manage tea companies have a presence out here. I appreciate your input on the discussion boards. You provide an invaluable perspective for us tea enthusiasts who don’t run tea companies. And I appreciate your offers to send out free samples (when you do).
I like hearing what you observed about your experience with your own tea. AND, your choice to write your review from as objective a standpoint as possible will, I believe, help to ensure the review is written with integrity (i.e. notes about brewing parameters, and color, aroma, and other verifiable descriptors about how the tea leaves look and smell, and other verifiable descriptors about the tea liquor, like specific flavor notes you tasted that others may very well taste). I know it’s impossible to be completely objective, as that’s the nature of being human. Yet, sticking to verifiable information in your review—-DATA—-is, I believe, an effective way to be as objective as possible. Data can be very valuable in the review of your tea, especially if you brewed multiple infusions of the tea using different brewing parameters and got different results each time.
I hope you understand where I’m coming from when I say that your review is based on a unique standpoint from a rating/review perspective; thus, assigning a numerical rating to the tea for your review, which is largely subjective (if not completely), creates, I judge, a conflict of interest. It skews the overall rating of the tea. So I invite you to leave off the numerical rating. I notice that some retailers review their teas, but do not rate them. Quite honestly, I am more likely to buy from tea retailers that give a more objective review of their tea.
If you choose to review your own tea, then great, by all means, do it! The more perspectives I see on one’s experience with a tea, the better. Certainly, whatever you do with your reviews is your choice, not mine; all I ask is that you keep it as objective as possible. That way, I am more likely to buy your tea. And my buying from you means we are both able to share in the giving and receiving of the joys of tea!
I just went through to verify that you can indeed ‘review’ a tea without rating it (meaning, write notes about it, but not assign it a numerical rating). To do this you have to make sure NOT to touch or move the rating smiley face slider bar at all (as soon as you do, it will register a rating). And even if you’ve rated it previously (or inadvertently touched that little green slider with your mouse), and you want to remove the rating, I just discovered a way to do that. The words, ‘Your Rating’, which are all the way to left of the rating scale horizontal bar, will have a tiny little ‘x’ to the right of it. Selecting this will remove the numeric rating (the bar will return to being completely grey, and the green and grey slider button will return to where it was).
I hope this helps with any questions about how to review without rating. : )
btw, here’s an interesting link about how to spell that color that lies between black and white on a monochrome spectrum. http://www.greyorgray.com/
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