Tetley is an English beverage manufacturer, and the world's second
largest manufacturer and distributor of tea. Tetley's manufacturing and
distribution business is spread across 40 countries and sells over 60 branded
tea bags. It is the largest tea company in the United Kingdom and Canada and the
second largest in the United States by volume. It is a wholly owned subsidiary
of Tata Global Beverages. After Tetley was purchased by the Tata
Group in 2000, most of its business in Asia was integrated with Tata Tea and
the company planned to completely integrate its worldwide business with
Tata Tea by 2006. The new group, Tata Tea Group, later renamed Tata Global
Beverages, is the second largest manufacturer of tea in the world after
Unilever. History
In 1822, brothers Joseph and Edward Tetley sold salt from a pack horse in
Yorkshire, England. They started to sell tea and the venture became such a
success that they set up as tea merchants "Joseph Tetley & Co." in 1837.
They relocated to London in 1856 and set up "Joseph Tetley & Company, Wholesale
Tea Dealers". It was the first company to sell tea in tea-bags in the United
Kingdom in 1953. In 1952, in an early example of
cross-promotion, Petula Clark's single "Anytime Is Tea-Time Now" was used to
advertise Tetley on Radio Luxembourg. The Tetley Group was created in July
1995 as a result of a buy-in management buy-out, when a group of investors
bought the worldwide beverage business from Allied Domecq. The Tetley Group was
bought by India's Tata Group in February 2000 for £271 million. It was one of the
largest overseas acquisitions by an Indian company at that time. Tata Group
is one of India's largest business conglomerates comprising more than 100
companies including Tata Global Beverages. The acquisition has helped
Tata's business ambitions to hold a global tea company. As India reduces
import duties on tea, Tata Global Beverages has offset its reduced share
of the domestic market by gains in Europe and North America.
In 2014, Columbia Law School and The Guardian reported that some of Tetley's
tea is harvested by workers who do not receive the minimum wage in India. In a
statement placed on its website, Tetley's parent company, Tata Global
Beverages, announced it had "appointed legal advisors to verify compliances by
independent review. The legal advisors will also appoint and commission an
independent third party Solidaridad to make an assessment into the living and
working conditions of the workers at the APPL plantations.". The company has
claimed that APPL is not used in Tetley tea internationally, and that it has
supplied only one small shipment of Assam tea for use in Tetley in India in
the last three years. UNICEF announced in October 2014 that
they are working with tea companies and with the Ethical Tea Partnership to
tackle child exploitation in Indian tea communities. The three-year program is
funded by a number of advocacy groups, Tata Global Beverages and Tesco.
= Products = Original Black Tea
Decaf Redbush
The Blend Collection Extra Strong
Kenyan Gold Blend of Both
Green Tea Pure
Lemon Decaf
Super Green Tea Berry Burst
Tropical Lemon and Honey
Lime Earl Grey
Peppermint Camomile
See also Brooke Bond
Lipton PG Tips
Tata Tea Tetley Tea Folk
Typhoo tea Yorkshire Tea
References ^ tata.com : Tetley's fiscal show to
jazz up Tata Tea results Archived 11 November 2006 at the Wayback Machine
^ "Tata Global Beverages". www.tata.com. Retrieved 21 March 2015.
^ "History of Tetley Tea". Retrieved 25 April 2008.
^ Tata Global Beverages - Brand Detail ^ "Error". tetleyusa.com.
^ "BrandsTell. Tetley's history". brandstell.com.
^ "Tata Global Beverages Services Ltd.: Private Company Information -
Businessweek". Businessweek.com. ^ tata.com : Tetley purchase at £ 271
million Archived 11 November 2006 at the Wayback Machine
^ "The More Things Change...". web.law.columbia.edu. Columbia Law
School, The Human Rights Institute. January 2014. Retrieved 6 April 2014.
^ Chamberlain Sonitpur, Gethin. "India's tea firms urged to act on slave
trafficking after girls freed". theguardian.com. The Observer. Retrieved
1 March 2014. dependent-assessment-of-appl-plantations
^ "Tea giants join partnership to tackle child exploitation in Indian tea
communities". External links
Official web site