2026: How much will you spend on tea this year!?

My personal breakdown from past years:

2025 – $10853.67
2024 – $7178.49
2023 – $9947.51
2022 – $9466.96
2021 – $10399.22
2020 – $7920.87
2019 – $4791.51
2018 – $3929.54
2017 – $3805.50
2016 – $2034.13
2015 – $1998.46
2014 – $1466.61

I didn’t do very great last year in terms of total spending. In fact, I spent a record amount on total purchases. However, the bulk of that was actually on teaware and not tea! To me, that says the mini goals I set that were tea related worked pretty well – so I’m sticking to most of those this year.

Part of why my teaware total was so bad was that I got very into my local pottery scene. Like, more than ever before. I went to more local markets, maker’s shows, and pottery conventions than any other year I’ve lived in Montreal. While I loved supporting those local creators I definitely need to cool it down a lot this year. Hopefully now having a piece in my collection from so many potters/ceramicists will mean I feel less inclined to add new pieces from the same artists…

This year I’m setting an aggressive overall goal of spending less than HALF of my 2025 total on combined tea and teaware purchases. We’ll call that $5500 – or about equivalent to $460/month.

It’s an aggressive decline, but still equates to plenty of budget left for the restocking some favourite teas, trying new things, and still picking up a few special teaware pieces throughout the year. I think the fact I really want to invest in getting more tattoos will help, because the redirected budget from tea/teaware will be going there instead.

To help me stay on track I’ve set some micro goals/rules:

1. No buying new mugs unless they are handmade from small/indie creators
2. No impulse purchases (ie. wait at least 24 hours before ordering)
3. Be more selective of what tea and teaware samples I bring home from work
4. Max of two orders per month (w/ exception for tea festivals & work-related travel)
5. No new tins of matcha until I’ve finished the equivalent number of tins

January $746.09
white2tea (Tea + Teaware) $217.00
Camellia Sinensis (Tea + Teaware) $290.17
Bitterleaf Teas (Teaware) $238.92

February $791.00
Toronto Tea Festival (Tea) $605.00
Secret Tea Time (Teaware) $186.00

March $1338.00
Charlie Cummings Gallery (Teaware) $512.00
Bird & Blend (Tea) $150.00
Bitterleaf Teas (Tea) $149.00
white2tea (Tea) $340.00
white2tea (Tea + Teaware) $188.00

TEA SPENDING TOTAL: $1694.58
TEAWARE SPENDING TOTAL: 1240.51

GRAND TOTAL: $2876.09

2019 total: $200
2020 total: $195.57
2021 total: $57.20
2022 total: $86.25
2023 total: $66.38
2024 total: $212.63
2025 total: $124.13

My goal is spending $0 in 2026…
2026 total:
$14.15 sweet matcha
$75 Davidstea

So I did pretty well last year over all (minus the gift card) and I’d like to continue along those lines this year. Restock my staples when they need restocking. Limit purchases for other teas to smaller amounts and stick to only doing a handful of those over the course of the year. I don’t need to try everything that draws my interest.

History:
2021 total – $329.44
2022 total – $443.88 (+ gift cards – $190.75)
2023 total – $203.77 (+ gift cards – $84.25)
2024 total – $345.43 (+ gift cards – $100.12)
2025 total – $179.38 (+ gift cards – $102.99)

No exact goal. Lets just see what happens.

Jan/Feb/Mar
None

Running Total – $0

Thanks for starting this thread again Roswell Strange!

The goal for last year was to only spend on two things: seasonal countdown boxes and advents, and I was relatively successful at that goal. I spent 60% less on tea last year than the year before. Similar goal this year, though I know I’m going to have some general tea purchases early in the year that’ll probably drive spending up!

I don’t count tea shop spending if it’s consumed there; it only counts if I’m bringing leaf home. Also not counting tea-adjacent things like pins, stationery, etc.

Previous years’ spending
2014: $965.89
2015: $961.50
2016: $734.75
mid-2017: $581.12 (stopped tracking halfway through the year)
2022: $1,506.46 (higher in reality but there are purchases I didn’t record)
2023: $1,940.83
2024: $1,400.51
2025: $558.12

January
Te Company: $36 (tea)

February (Canada trip)
Tea Store: $71.12 usd/$97 cad (tea)
Canada in a Basket: $42.16 usd/$57.50 cad (tea)
Epices de Cru: $79 usd/$107.75 cad (tea)
Foggy River: $62.32 usd/$85 cad (tea)
The Tea Girl: $63.50 usd/$86.61 cad (tea)
Manoir Hovey: $16.86 usd/$23 cad (tea)

2019 $383.53
2020 $528.07
2021 $449.05
2022 $590.98
2023 $715.02
2024 $755.16
2025 $573.89

2026 TOTAL $

My spending was really low last year! Not sure that it has resulted in a smaller cupboard though. No goals for this year other than sipping down more of what I already have.

2018: 740
2019: 848.36
2020: 796.40
2021: 972.92
2022: 542.79
2023: 565.69
2024: 643.82
2025: 296.87

Feb: 31.94 August Uncommon

I have way more tea than any one person can drink. For this reason, I’m focusing this year on smaller quantities of higher-quality tea that I’ve been wanting to try for a while. Some of these teas are benchmark Taiwanese oolongs, such as Tea Master’s Dayuling and some competition Bai Hao from Camellia Sinensis. No doubt some spring 2026 greens will also make their way into my life.

I’m also buying tea for my business, which I won’t include here.

February
Camellia Sinensis: $185.98 CAD (70 g tea, teaware)
Tea Masters: US$117.75 (135 g)

Can’t break the streak…

2025: 579.66 CAD
2024: 567.35 CAD
2023: 171.18 USD 548.59 CAD
2022: 947.00 CAD; 171.53 USD
2021: 343.84 USD 432.54 CAD
2020: 387.45 USD; 683.35 CAD
2019: 288.89 USD; 120.33 CAD *mat leave
2018: 179.08 USD; 34.89 CAD *pregnant
2017: 317.27 USD 268.58 CAD
2016: 170.69 USD 170.21 CAD
2015: 1075.10 USD 206.21 CAD *paris trip
2014: 1320.42 USD 320.18 CAD

March
Tea Runners – 115.11 CAD

2026 Total: 115.11 CAD

I stopped tracking for a couple of years. I probably spent about 300-500 per year. I’m on a no buy, but realistically I will probably purchase from a few places to refill specific teas (because that’s happened already). I need to work on reducing the size of my cupboard and the number of teas in it.

I really only drink whites, blacks, herbals and occasionally greens, oolongs, and shou. Everything else needs to be drunk or given away. A lot of it is super old.

2026
Harney $45
Little Woods $20?
Davidson’s Organics $15.90