☕ Tea Bags: An Accidental Invention!?
Tea bags were not invented by design, but by pure accident! Turns out, this humble tea bag does more harm than good. How? Read on.
Tea Bags.
What is the first thing that comes to your mind?
A train journey? A flight? Or your office?
Well, well.
Thank the inventors of tea bags for making instant tea available. Thank the inventors of tea bags for making that last meeting or lecture bearable!
Or…
Maybe not.
Because tea bags were an accidental invention!
Now, let’s go back in time and brew the origin story of tea bags.
The Tea-bag Tale
It all started in 1990.
There was a tea merchant named Thomas Sullivan who liked experimenting.
One fine day, he started distributing tea samples in small silk pouches.
Now, this seemed very fancy to some customers.
They assumed that this was an infusion method.
Instead of opening the pouch and pouring the tea leaves into the water, they directly dipped the pouch in hot water.
That was it!
The 'tea bag' as we know it today was born.
And as with all successful experiments around new products, sales follows great customer experience.
In no time, Sullivan realised that tea bags were actually responsible for a super boost in revenues.
Little did he know that it could become an everyday item today.
The global tea bags market was valued at $6.1 billion in 2021 and is projected to reach $12.9 billion by 2031. That’s a CAGR of 7.6%!
While the demand and popularity is picking up, tea bags do more harm than good.
They are like that bachpan-ka-friend who we have out-grown, but just can’t say no to.
Yep, kinda toxic.
Toxic Tea Bags
Yes, when you use tea bags, you could be consuming toxins and microplastics along with the tea.
Most tea bags manufactured today have at least 20-30% plastic (especially pyramid-shaped bags). These tea bags, when dipped in hot water, release microplastics of 16mg per cup!
For a mental comparison – 10gm of table salt has 0.05mg of plastic.
Missed identifying this toxic trait in the same way you overlooked the toxicity of your ex?
Ouch.
But why need plastic for a tea bag?
You see, plastic (polypropylene or nylon) is required in a tea bag to help heat-seal during manufacture. Heat sealing ensures that tea bags don’t open in your cup.
These microplastics are bad for our health as well as the environment.
Regularly consuming these microplastics can cause cell damage, immune disruption, neurotoxicity and whatnot.
And the plastic in tea bags isn’t recyclable or compostable. So these small bags end up in our overfilled landfills – one of the biggest environmental problems.
Now that we’ve identified this toxicity, we have two options: break up or ask our beloved ‘tea bag’ to change.
What should we do?
Exactly what we do with toxic partners: ask them to change.
Obviously.
Healthier Alternatives
A lot of companies are identifying sustainable options. These include tea bags made from ‘PLA’ (Polylactic Acid), a plant-based plastic or “bio-plastic”.
A well-known tea brand in the UK - Hampstead Tea has introduced stitched tea bags rather than heat-sealed tea bags.
Tata Consumer Products, which owns ‘Tetley’ is also in the process of producing compostable tea bags.
Lots of other brands have also mushroomed in this space.
This is what we got on Amazon when we searched for ‘biodegradable tea bags in india’:
With the world moving towards a health revolution, it is important for companies to introduce healthier solutions.
After all, health is a necessi-TEA (hahaa, pun intended)!
Hope this was insightful for you.
Go, grab a healthier version of tea bag now - or maybe do away with them entirely!
Do let us know if you will be giving up tea bags in the comments. And share this with a chai lover!