Why Is Silver Needle Tea So Expensive?
We already explained in the previous article about “how tea is made” and explained the definition of white tea. The next question our clients usually ask next is, “why is silver needle tea so expensive?”.
Silver needle tea is a type of white tea – which means it is made from new leaves and buds of the tea plant. The leaves are plucked and sun-dried which means the antioxidants retained by this process is found to be much more than other types of teas.
The most delicate tea out of white teas is the silver needle, which is hand harvested from tiny, young leaves of the tea plant. The tiny buds then get withered and air dried as soon as they are harvested.
During this process, you will notice that the tea farmers are only taking only the youngest buds. It takes great care in order to preserve the fine white hairs present on the tea leaves. And the most expensive of the white teas is the silver needle, which is made only from the single tips of the tea stem. The harvesting process is very time consuming and production is limited – making it one of the rarest teas in the market.