New tea subscription idea, but need feedback on the idea.
For those of you that do not know of Simple Loose Leaf, we offer a customizable tea subscription service. The basic idea is that a customer builds a list of teas and that list becomes their subscription for the next 3 to 6 months.
We FIRMLY believe that the tea community wants/needs a customizable tea of the month club option. But as brilliant as we think our idea is, it is too complicated and take too much time for a customer to build a subscription. (Takes 30 to 45 minutes and everyone ends up scraping their list and starting over.)
So here is what we are thinking: “You Pick” Tea of the Month Club $11.50/month with free shipping. (US only to start.)
- Every month around the 5th we send our subscribers an email that has three tea option in it. (See below for a rough schedule of the tea selection. And the selection of teas does not and will not always come strictly from the catalog SLL has on our website. We can and will expand to cover other “Brands” of teas.)
- Each customer then selects what tea, from the list of 3, they want us to send them the following month. (The 3 teas would range in quantities of .5 oz (rare) to 2 oz.. Though typically 1 oz. to 2 oz. being the range. The different amounts of tea are to balance the value the customer gets. This allows different teas to fit inside a flat price tea subscription.)
- On the 1st, or as close to it as possible, of each month we ship out the tea packages.
- And Repeat.
Tea Schedule:
Odd Months (Starting in Jan.) choose one of the following teas.
- Traditional Green (May have light flavoring such as jasmine or magnolia but nothing sweet.)
- White Tea (Again, may be flavored but will aim for subtle flavoring and not super sweet, most of the time.)
- Flavored Tea (Could be black, green, roobious, herbal, chai… Big category here.)
Even Months (Starting in Feb.) choose one of the following teas.
- Oolong (Any Oolong could make this list, maybe a straight Oolong or one with slight flavoring i.e. jasmine, magnolia, almond…)
- Traditional Black (Trad Blacks, Non Flavored Breakfast blends, Earl Greys without excessive flavoring…)
- Flavored (Same rules as Flavored above.)
My questions to Steepster:
- Is this an idea that you like/would participate in? (Note: If you say that you are interested we are not going to start spamming you with invites.)
- Is the price okay?
- Should we charge more and offer larger quantities of tea?
- Other thoughts or ideas?
Any input offered would mean the world to us at Simple Loose Leaf.
Cheers,
Andrew Flocks
PS: We have a sign up form to get an idea of interest level. You can take a look at the final product here and soft commit to the club here: http://www.simplelooseleaf.com/products/you-pick-it-tea-of-the-month-club
It’s an interesting idea, although I don’t know if I’d want to pay $11.50 for just one tea. I find I prefer more varieties of tea, in smaller bags, much like what Amoda offers. And then if I really love that tea, if like the option to order 2oz of more.
That being said, I really do like the idea of being able to make some kind of selection each month instead of risking getting a flavour you don’t enjoy, or worse, have allergies to.
What would you do if people didn’t make a choice by the deadline? I think it’s safe to assume some people will forget to make their choice. Will you have a default that you’ll send? (Like Columbia’s CD if the month?)
I’m in Canada so I can’t try this out yet, but I’ll keep an eye in what you guys do.
Thanks for replying.
As for the price, to have more teas in the offering the price would have to go up. And that is a large part of what we are trying to figure out. The balance between quantity of tea and price is hard. Do we offer less tea at a lower price or offer more tea at a higher price. Some flavoured teas are super cheap, while other traditional teas are expensive. And making both teas fit in the format is problematic. Though I know there is a way to work it out.
There would be a “Default” tea that if no choice is made, we send the customer that tea. The default tea would be one of the teas on the list, and would likely be one of the traditional teas or Oolong teas.
Thanks for the input.
For half an ounce of tea? No way.
In my honest opinion for the $11.50 please send two teas plus add shipping
Could you clarify what you mean by “Two teas plus add shipping”?
Does that mean that the $11.50 should include two teas and the price of shipping.
Or
$11.50 should include two teas and then the cost of shipping is added after the fact? Shipping would be something around $2.50 USPS First Class.
And the .5oz would be some crazy pricy tea. The target quantity would be 1oz to 2oz. But I completely understand the reservation of .5 oz even being an option.
Thanks for your input.
I can understand charging that much for an expensive half an oz of tea, but what if you offered smaller samples?
“(The 3 teas would range in quantities of .5 oz (rare) to 2 oz.. Though typically 1 oz. to 2 oz. being the range”
-instead offer 2 two teas that are .25 oz to 1 oz?
Of course I can’t speak for everyone, but I’d be happier trying two smaller teas than one large tea. But maybe this subscription wouldn’t be marketed at people like me. :)
Good luck!
Cavocorax,
To be honest, I am almost entirely unconcerned with what the ultimate price and quantities of the tea are as long as I, the merchant, and you, the tea community, find value in the product.
The original idea of this was to offer a list of 10 teas. The list would have a part A and part B. You could either select one tea from list A or two tea from list B. But that method get complicated very quickly.
Another option would be to expand the list to 5 teas each month. And you can make two tea selections. You can pick the same tea twice or two different teas. The teas would have lower base quantity, .5 oz to 1 oz., so if someone wants more teas they can select multiple teas or if they want more of a single tea they can do that.
Thoughts?
Also, to anyone. Should the cost of shipping be included or separate?
Any tea at $11.50 for half an oz…YIKES!
I would hope it was premium and from Paris or something
truly holding very high expectations.
$11.50 plus the price for shipping is not bad for two teas…JMHO…
I agree with Cavocorax that I would be much happier trying two smaller
teas vs.just one larger one.
What about a price of $15 for two teas and you throw in a “sample” of something
on their “profile” they are interested in trying?
Perhaps it is too much to keep track of customers interest profile?
Just an idea…
Thanks for listening :-)
“ou can make two tea selections. You can pick the same tea twice or two different teas. The teas would have lower base quantity, .5 oz to 1 oz., so if someone wants more teas they can select multiple teas or if they want more of a single tea they can do that.”
- I like this! Then people can still get larger quantities if they want it, while others can sample ALL THE TEAS. :) And I don’t think that should complicate it too much…
How did you want people to respond? Are you going to collect all this data in emails, or would we just log into our account and click on the right box?
“Any tea at $11.50 for half an oz…YIKES!”
Yeah, I agree completely.
I love the price point of $11.50+shipping. That gives me room to throw in some pricier teas and not blow the budget.
How about this for the $15 price point. Still have the select 2 teas as described above, but the sample is picked by the customer from the following month’s list. i.e. You get an email today that has January’s teas in it. You make your selection for January. There is also a list of teas that are being featured in February, and from this list you select your sample (6 grams to 14 grams).
Thoughts on that?
And no, thank you for listening and being willing to converse with me. You, both of you, are helping me to add real value to the tea community.
Cavocorax,
You snuck your response in on me. There could vary much be a “6th” option that is a small amount of all of the teas. And perhaps that should be the “Default” option that people receive if they do not respond.
As for data collection, we would send out an email that talks about the teas that are available for selection. The email would have a like that takes you to a MailChimp form that asks for your Name, Email, and has several drop down menus for your to make your selections. Then you get submit and you are good to go. Ideally the entire process takes the customer 2-5 minutes to complete.
Thank you for your thoughts.
P.S. Andrew, I tried to message you, but you are not following me, so…
a full explanation of my thoughts is “stuck”…lol…
I love the $15 price point!!!
Hopefully others would agree :-)
You said, “How about this for the $15 price point. Still have the select 2 teas as described above, but the sample is picked by the customer from the following month’s list. i.e. You get an email today that has January’s teas in it. You make your selection for January. There is also a list of teas that are being featured in February, and from this list you select your sample (6 grams to 14 grams).”…..
I LOVE, LOVE, LOVE THIS IDEA and would defininitely join…
Especially if you could bill on the 3rd…lol…my day :-)
I have to admit the standard subscription is a little hard to grasp when you first go to the site. It’s really not that complicated once you go through it, and I like the sliding prices based on the subscription length.
I think the two biggest obstacles I see are 1) Forking over large sums of cash up front when you aren’t sure of the quality of what you will get. 2) Even 2oz is a lot of a tea for many Steepster folks – maybe not so much for people in the real world ;D
I can say having tried 3 of the 4 teas I have already received I have found them to be a solid value.
My suggestion would be to consider a sample (or collection) of the month subscription. Keep it as inexpensive as possible. That might give more exposure so people can find teas they would like to see take up staple space.
Based on your latest proposal I find I am personally a little confused as to who you are targeting with it. I generally think in terms of cheap tea (entry level), value tea (best bang for the buck), and highest quality tea (expensive). There is certainly a place for each. I just don’t know which category this subscription fits. Maybe others will see this differently and offer a better perspective.
Wow, KS, you definitely offered food for thought.
Knowing target audience is pretty big :-)
KS,
Thanks for your thoughts, first off.
“I think the two biggest obstacles I see are 1) Forking over large sums of cash up front when you aren’t sure of the quality of what you will get. 2) Even 2oz is a lot of a tea for many Steepster folks – maybe not so much for people in the real world ;D”
Yeah, this is an issue.
As to who we are targeting with this “You Pick” tea of the Month Club, we are trying to figure out a way to offer customization in a cleaner format. And this subscription is likely best for the value tea lovers that want to expand their tea collection. The issue with the very high end teas is that their are companies that do it 10x better than SLL can. And if we entered that market we would not be adding value, not really. With this product we offer something that nobody else offers and we can easily offer teas that are not on our regular catalog.
You make a great point. This is something that I have to define better. Thank you for pointing that out. Seriously.
Your welcome.
I was pretty sure you were aiming at best for the value. I see you are just throwing thoughts out there at present but the $11.50/.5oz threw me off too.
So unlike your present system, this would be more pay as you go? That would solve the first issue I raised.
Yeah, this would be a pay as you go. We have gotten great feedback from everyone that has purchased, but from the data we have a lot of people are turned off by the idea at first. So this would a way for us to get traction in the tea community, and to add value to the tea community at the same time.
And the .5 oz would have to crazy expensive tea to fall into that category. But from what I am getting, nobody wants that type of option to be in the tea subscription. They want choice and variety.
Thanks for your thoughts.
Cheers.
Will this replace the way things are now? As someone else said, things now are really not that complicated once you visit the site. I love the original idea. It is affordable and offers enough variety.
This would not replace our current tea subscriptions. This is a way for people that don’t have the time or knowledge to go digging through our catalog a way to explore new teas and customize their subscription at the same time.
It is a hybrid of traditional tea of the month clubs and our fully customizable tea of the month club.
I pay £11.95 for four teas and that includes delivery and tasting notes. Every month is something different.
I like not knowing what I am getting and letting an expert pick something nice.
It all sounds too complicated
Morebloodytea,
I can understand you desire to not know. For some people that is hat they want in a tea club. And there are companies that do that in an amazing way, Verdant for example. But there are not any clubs that offer the kind of customization that we are offering. (It is kind of our thing.)
I appreciate your thoughts.
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