新聞來源：中廣新聞網
Decades ago, tea makers took out ads that urged coffee-mad consumers to “Take tea and see.” Today, a leader in the booming tea market is asking tea drinkers to take another look at their favorite beverage.
In a campaign now under way, Celestial Seasonings, a division of the Hain Celestial Group, is promoting its “green” business practices along with the health and diet benefits of its teas, green or otherwise.
The campaign is appearing in print, outdoors, online and in stores. It will also be supported with sampling programs at ski resorts, where skiers will get free tea bags or cups of hot tea served to them from insulated jugs.
The ads seek to appeal to consumers in their 20’s and 30’s, primarily women, as well as the older tea aficionados who were in those age groups when Celestial Seasonings was introduced by the hippie entrepreneurs, Mo Siegel and Wyck Hay, in 1969.
The campaign is the first work from a new agency for Celestial Seasonings, TDA Advertising and Design in Boulder, Colo. For the last several years, the limited advertising that the company ran was created internally.
The budget for the new campaign is being estimated at $3 million to $5 million, a fivefold or sixfold increase in spending compared with the last couple of years.
The campaign is also meant to familiarize consumers with a rebranding effort that includes a new look for the Celestial Seasonings logo as well as a redesign of the product packages. The makeover is the brainchild of the Sterling Group in New York.
Celestial Seasonings is stepping up its marketing as the thriving dry-tea industry — the market for tea bags, rather than tea in bottles — becomes more crowded and compartmentalized. The brand competes in the segment of the market known as specialty, gourmet or premium, along with rivals like Bigelow, Harney & Sons, Stash, Tazo, Twinings and Yogi Tea.
For instance, the December issue of More magazine, aimed at the important tea-drinking demographic group of women in their 40’s and 50’s, carries ads for Celestial Seasonings, Twinings and Yogi.
Celestial Seasonings also competes to some degree with the many mass-market, lower-priced brands of tea bags, which include Lipton, Red Rose, Salada and Tetley.
Celestial Seasonings is the best-seller in the higher-priced segment of the dry-tea market and is No.2 among all brands, behind Lipton.
“There are a lot of teas out there,” says Matt Sungy, senior product manager for the Celestial Seasonings brand, also based in Boulder.
“The category can be a little cluttered,” he adds.
The new campaign and rebranding efforts are intended “to bring Celestial Seasonings up to the 21st century,” Mr. Sungy says, “and make it easier for consumers to shop the category” — for his products, of course.
Previously, the box for each flavor had its own distinctive look, which tended to play down their common identities as varieties of Celestial Seasonings.
“Some of the artwork remains the same” after the redesigns, Mr. Sungy says, like the drawing of the bear that represents the Sleepytime variety of herb tea, a blend of chamomile and spearmint leaves.
The company hired TDA last spring to create a campaign because “we felt like we wanted fresh ideas from an outside group,” Mr. Sungy says.
Research conducted among consumers by the agency as well as by Celestial Seasonings found that there was an opportunity, “more than any time in the past,” he adds, to speak to younger and older tea drinkers, ages 25 to 55, with similar messages.
“The age groups seem disparate,” Mr. Sungy says, “but a lot of the same general interests are there.”
One such interest is book clubs and reading clubs, he adds, so plans call for the introduction of a Celestial Seasonings Book Club with its own Web site, where readers will be able to find discussion guides and make comments on forums.
Another interest shared by younger and older tea drinkers is in how a company conducts itself in the business world.
That is addressed in one new magazine ad, which carries this headline: “When we started, fair trade meant the tea showed up in Boulder after we paid for it.”
Another print ad addresses the “green” aspects of Celestial Seasonings. “Use a tea bag without a string and save a tree,” the ad declares. “Or at the very least, save a string.”
The ad says that by forgoing tags and strings on its tea bags, Celestial Seasonings keeps “over 3 million pounds of paper from being deposited in landfills every year.”
“It’s another way Celestial Seasonings is making our world a better place to live,” the ad concludes.
Health issues are also high on the lists of interests of women ages 25 to 55. One magazine ad addressing that carries a puckish headline: “This tea has many health benefits, none of which have to be followed by pages of possible side effects.”
Weight-watching is another shared interest of the target audience, which is the subject of a series of ads being tested in Boston. The ads are appearing on signs in trains and train stations.
All three test ads show paper or plastic cups of goopy, elaborate coffee drinks. The cups all bear descriptions modeled after the words printed on the sides of cups in gourmet coffee shops, used to identify customers’ choices, but with pointed messages about calorie counts.
One ad shows a coffee drink topped with chocolate syrup and a cherry. There are three words on the side of the cup: “Non-fat,” “low-fat” and “fat.” There is a big “X” next to “fat.”
In the second ad, a coffee drink topped with foam and cinnamon has these three words on the side of the cup: “Chin,” “double chin” and “triple chin.” The big “X” is marked next to the third choice.
Similarly, in the third ad, a coffee drink topped with foam and syrup has these three words on the side of the cup: “Pants,” “sweat pants” and “mumu.” In this instance, the big “X” appears next to “mumu.”
Each ad shows a box of Celestial Seasonings tea with “0 calories” next to the photograph. Across the bottom is an invitation “to learn more about the benefits of our teas” at the brand’s Web site, celestialseasonings.com.
“Tea is so hot with young people,” says Jonathan Schoenberg, creative director at TDA, no pun intended.
At the same time, he adds, the campaign can help Celestial Seasonings “reassert itself with the boomer consumer.”
The fact that the company had no visible advertising presence “for a long time” was beginning to harm the brand, Mr. Schoenberg says, as research showed “all these young people who aren’t really aware of Celestial.
Because “the quality of the tea and the practices of the company should be impressive to young people,” those points are being stressed in the new campaign, he adds.
The campaign is not seeking to jettison “the hippie past” of Celestial Seasonings, Mr. Schoenberg says, because the research found that it was a positive attribute among consumers.
That accounts for the ad making reference to the fair trade policies as well as a magazine ad invoking the founding of the company, which carries this headline: “Hiking boots, a botany textbook and an old pick-up. This was venture capital for a tea company in 1969.”
Still, “we want to be a contemporary brand,” Mr. Schoenberg says, hence the ads comparing Celestial Seasonings with the oh-so-popular specialty coffee drinks.
“Because the category is so competitive, we have to talk to as many consumers as possible,” he adds, “bringing in new consumers” while continuing to satisfy “the devoted consumer” who has bought Celestial Seasonings for many years.
“The tea consumer is very interesting,” Mr. Schoenberg says, because she “bounces from brand to brand.”
Even customers who are loyal to Celestial Seasonings are “promiscuous,” he adds, in that they will also buy other brands.
The print ads are appearing in magazines that in addition to More include Eating Well, Food & Wine, Health, Natural Health, Prevention and Real Simple.
There are also special ads being created for The New Yorker magazine. They include tiny ads for Sleepytime in the upper right corners of pages, which appear to be dog-eared as if the reader had stopped at that page to make a cup of tea.
The special New Yorker ads also include a pitch printed on the back side of the flaps attached to issues sold on newsstands promoting the contents inside.
“Here’s to magazine articles long enough to require a bookmark,” the ads proclaim above a cup of tea bearing the new Celestial Seasonings logo.
“I like that these ads are celebrating The New Yorker and not putting Celestial Seasonings first,” Mr. Schoenberg says.
“As we move forward, I hope the advertising becomes less and less like advertising,” he adds.
Would that we could all take tea and see that.
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If you like In Advertising, be sure to read the Advertising column that appears Monday through Friday in the Business Day section of The New York Times newspaper.
2007年11月23日
中国茶評論家・工藤佳治
――コンパクトな書籍で、名は永遠に
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「何字書いたの？」。この質問の意味を知る日本人は、あまり多くないかもしれない。本や論文を書いた時、中国の人たちがする質問である。意味するところは、何十万字も書いたことは、それだけで評価される。大作がよい、とする伝統である。
学術論文も同じだと聞く。その業績評価でまず聞かれるのは、内容よりも、今までの論文の累積字数である。
そんな中国文化の中にあって、書いた字数は少なくとも、聖人として、神として、現在でもお茶の世界で評価されている人物がいる。唐代に生きた「陸 羽」である。「茶聖」「茶神」などと呼ばれ、尊敬され続けている。彼が後代にまで高い評価を残す所以になっているのは、１冊の薄い本である。世界で最初の 茶の総合書『茶経』である。８世紀後半に書かれた本だ。
『茶経』を見たことがなくても、彼の業績・評価に、私たちの周囲で触れることができる。京都の有名茶舗・一保堂の包装紙は、漢文で書かれた書の一部がレイアウトされて印刷されている。その包装紙の漢文は、この『茶経』の有名な書き出し部分である。
香港で歴史もあり、店構えも雰囲気がある有名な茶館「陸羽茶室」は、『茶経』の著者・陸羽の名を冠している。台湾の茶藝のメッカでもある「陸羽茶藝中心」も、この陸羽の名が冠されている。
「茶は南方の嘉木なり」という書き出しで始まる『茶経』は、手元にある復刻本でページ数を数えてみても、５６ページ。上中下の三巻で構成される。 その合計ページ数がこのページ数である。しかも文字がない白のページも３ページ含まれる。大著が評価される中国文化にあって、名著、しかも著者を聖人と評 価させるに至った書としては、意外な薄さである。
しかしこの薄い本は、じつは内容においては卓越し、充実した本である。
唐の時代、お茶はそれ以前の薬としての機能から、飲み物として一般的に普及された時代である。10章に分けられた章組みは、茶の生物学的起源に始 まり、製造の道具、製造の方法、茶器、いれ方、飲み方、歴史、生産地などで構成されている。当時までの茶に関する事柄を、集大成した本といえる。
これらの分野を、ある部分は文献学的に、ある部分は実際に調査したフィールドワーク風に、ある部分は分析的にといった手法を駆使し、まとめられている。そして、記述された内容においても、現在でも陳腐化していない、十分生きている内容になっている部分も多い。
「長くない」、そのことこそがこの本の卓越したところである。簡潔でありながら、その時代までの「茶」をあらゆる角度からアプローチしている。
彼がそのようにできた背景には、捨て子としてお寺で育てられ、教育された幼少期。そこを飛び出し、動乱の時代に翻弄されながら、旅回り劇団の座付き作家としての経験、今も書体にその名を残す顔真卿などの文人たちとの広い親交などがあったからと考えられる。
広い視野と旺盛な好奇心に支えられ、茶を見据えながら、それをコンパクトにかつ総合的にまとめ上げた名編集者であったからといえる。
それが、今の時代までも延々と彼を「茶聖」として評価させるに至った源であった。
「茶は南方の嘉木なり」。この冒頭の一文こそが、この本のすべてを象徴し、予感させ、また茶のすべてを言い尽すとも思える。以前には、さほど思わなかったが、茶が近くにある生活が長くなって、そのように感じられる。書き出し文としては名文である。
次回は、「中国紅茶は消えゆくのみか」（予定）です。
顧渚紫笋（こしょしじゅん・浙江省）
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陸羽が晩年を過ごした「湖州」は、唐代三大貢茶（献上茶）の一つ「紫笋茶」が作られていたところとしても有名である。中国で最初の「貢茶院」（皇 帝の直轄茶園）が作られた。唐の都・長安（今の西安）で、清明節に開かれる皇帝の宴でこのお茶が供されるために、管理する役人は間に合うよう茶を摘み、製 茶をし、早馬を走らせたという。
現在は、産地である「顧渚山」の名前をつけて、銘茶となっている。
爽やかで、上品な甘さの残るお茶である。
2007年11月16日
| 西尾市の新名物を目指す菓子「西尾スイーツ」と、開発に携わった関係者たち＝西尾市で |
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西尾市の新名物を目指す菓子「西尾スイーツ」の試食会が１５日、同市本町の自然食ビュッフェ「伝」で開かれ、一般参加の女性ら１０人が舌鼓を打った。
経済産業省の小規模事業者新事業全国展開支援事業の一環。菓子開発に参加したのは和菓子店「穂積堂」（鶴舞町）、みそ製造販売「はと屋」（吾妻町）、洋菓子店「ラコンチュルオカヤス」（末広町）の３店。
穂積堂は抹茶風味の豆乳を固め、もちでくるんだ「茶ぼーず」、はと屋は豆乳だんごをみそだれで味付けした「みそらしだんご」、ラコンチュルオカヤスは地元産抹茶の粉末を生クリームに混ぜた「モンチャッ茶」をそれぞれ独自に開発。職人の技を駆使して試作を重ねてきた。
試食会に参加した一色町の主婦大竹真裕美さん（３１）は「ヘルシーで食べやすかった」とご満悦。窓口の西尾商工会議所は１２月２３日までの毎週 木、土、日曜日に市内各所で試食会を開く。三つの菓子は来春以降に市内などで販売予定。試食会の問い合わせは、にしおよいとこ案内処＝電０５６３（５７） ７８４０＝へ。
（石原泰智）
