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Why We Sell What We Sell
 Do
you care about the food you eat ?
Do you know where your food comes from
?
We do.
We work with suppliers we know and trust, and who
share our pride in doing things right.
We believe this is essential to insure consistent quality
and the best finished food products.
As we
pass the 33rd anniversary of our store, it occurs to us
that many of our newer customers many not know what our
established customers know about us and the products we
sell. So, we thought that a brief explanation of our store
philosophy would be a good way to introduce ourselves
 1.
We personally hand-select all of the products that we
sell.
We do this by tasting before we buy, and we rely on
our experience and professional palates to
AYE or
NAY a product. Every
item on our shelves has a reason for being there - we do
not buy products to simply fill our shelves with
merchandise.
We work diligently to source our offerings and take pride
in being very knowledgeable as well as selective about
what we sell. Taste and quality are of utmost importance
to us, not a pretty package or slick advertising. In a
world that is being assaulted by a ‘dark and gathering
sameness’ we still look for foods and ingredients that
taste good and are well made.
2. We support traditional, artisan producers and small
manufacturers who produce sound, delicious food products.
We believe that it pays to know where one’s food comes
from, who is making it, what ingredients and production
methods they are using. We often ask ourselves why we
should support various food producers and so should you.
Our relationships with our vendors are based on trust and
mutual concern for quality and goodness. We don’t live in
a perfect world, but we should try to exercise as much
control as we can over our food choices.
  3.
We only sell authentic foods from the place that the food
is historically associated with. Location matters. We also
believe in Truth in Labeling and Traceability.
We believe strongly in terroir, origins and tradition and
refuse to sell products that are created just to fill a
marketing niche or to garner market share. For instance,
we only sell genuine Basmati rice from India, not
basmati-style rice grown in Texas. Ditto for our Thai
Jasmine rice, the Spanish saffron, our Kona coffee, the
Italian balsamic vinegars, the Italian porcini mushrooms,
the Lungching tea etc. We do not sell imitations of the
real thing – we support producers of the authentic
originals who respect tradition, seasonality, sustainable
agriculture, and cultural uniqueness. Those who strive to
protect the integrity of their products. They are the
‘flavor keepers’ for the planet. We do not sell generic
products – all of our products can be traced back to their
origin.
 4.
We buy our coffee from individual coffee farms or estates,
or from local cooperatives that bring the collective
harvest of many to market.
We do not buy from large agri-business profiteers who
spoil the land, contaminate the environment, and pay less
than a living wage. Our coffee comes from
coffee estates that produce the top 1% of all the coffee
that comes to market every season – not all
coffee for sale in the wholesale market is created equal.
This is why our coffee tastes so good and why cheap coffee
tastes so….cheap. We care about what goes into our
customers’ cups, and also the working conditions at the
farms.
 5.
We source our Chinese tea directly from China and our
other teas from import agents that we have solid,
long-term relationships with.
We know them, they know us, we trust them, they trust us,
and they know the kind of tea we want and don’t want. This
is business the old fashioned way, built on trust and a
common interest in buying and selling great products. The
best products go to the best customers willing to pay a
fair price - why would a tea agent let go of his best tea
to a business owner who doesn’t really care about the
product or to a shopkeeper who is just looking for the
lowest price? Quality products in the marketplace have
value that precedes them and the growers of these products
receive their price – low quality products rarely receive
fair value.
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