When Did Tea Bags Start in Australia? (Solved & Explained!)

Tea has been around for a long time and has become an essential part of Australian culture, but when did tea bags make their way to Australia?

The first record of tea bags in Australia was in 1926 when newspapers started to talk about the new trend of muslin tea bags that were easier to use than traditional methods of brewing tea. However, these bags didn’t have a string yet, which limited their use. 

Let’s discover when we started using tea bags and how tea companies switching to them greatly impacted their success in Australia. 

When Did We Start Using Tea Bags?

While it would take into the 1920s for tea bags to make their way to Australia, they have been around since around 1908 in America. a New York Tea Merchant named Thomas Sullivan started it to make samples of his tea that he would give his customers in small silken bags. People enjoyed the convenience that it soon became popular.

Why Did Tea Bags Become Popular in Australia?

 It wasn’t long before tea bags began to be extremely popular in all parts of the world, including Australia. The biggest advantage of using tea bags is that you don’t have to measure tea leaves and clean the infuser. Tea leaves are notoriously tricky to clean out of whatever you’re using to infuse your tea, so having a disposable tea bag was convenient. 

Companies like Tetley even campaigned that tea bags were a more elegant and civilized way of drinking tea because they didn’t require the same clean-up. However, it wasn’t Tetley but Lipton who would end up successfully advertising tea bags to Australian.

The Rise of Lipton Tea in Australia

Lipton employed marketing techniques to make it seem like tea bags themselves were a revelation and would ensure that not only did you get a fantastic tasting cup of tea, but you wouldn’t have to deal with any of the soggy tea leaves left over in your cup. It also saved people time because they didn’t have to measure the tea leaves.

As the popularity of tea bags grew, loose tea brands like Bushell, a native to Australia, and commercial tea plantations were starting to fade out. They couldn’t compete with the marketing and convenience of tea packaged in individual bags.

Lipton vs. Bushell Tea in Australia

As a result of the rise in Lipton tea versus the original popular Bushell tea, they’re starting to become a clear split in the Australian tea market between those who preferred the convenience of teabags and those who stuck with the traditional loose leaf teas.

Bushell teeth even employed John Farnham to sing a jingle in their commercials to get more attention towards their Loop loose leaf tea in the 1980s. However, it didn’t have much success since tea bags had become such a norm to most Australian tea drinkers that they were unlikely to switch their habits.

By 1981, Lipton tea accounted for 22% of the market shares in bagged tea, whereas Bushells tea was only 6%. However, Bushells tea significantly outranked Lipton for loose leaf tea in the market shares at 29%.

Lipton’s dominance of market shares would continue into 1997 when they had 24% of the market shares, which compares to Bushells at 14%. Tea bags had become so dominant that most people didn’t buy loose leaf tea, and there wasn’t much of a market except for those passionate about brewing tea.

The Fall of the Australian Tea Company Bushells

Bushells efforts to compete with Lipton were eventually not as Unilever would acquire Bushells in the late 90s, which was the upper company owning Lipton teas, ultimately making them less competitors as sibling tea companies.

You can still buy Bushells to you today, but it doesn’t have the same roots in Australia that they once did. Had it been able to shift to tea bags sooner and been at the front of the wave for this trend before Lipton, there might have been a different story.

Lipton’s Popularity Becoming Its Downfall

Lipton tea would continue to be one of Australia’s most popular tea brands, but its popularity didn’t have the same prestige that it once did. As a result, it needed to sell its products for cheaper, and it didn’t have the same niche market it once did. People want a loyal to lift in the company but looking for an affordable option.

Tea drinking has a history of being something that affluent classes enjoy and isn’t something that the average consumer is likely to make a habit of, unlike coffee. As a result, Lipton was losing some of its edge in the market because it could become such a common commodity, leaving an opening for a new company to emerge and replace them.

The Impact of Tea Bags on the Tea Market in Australia

As you can probably guess from the above summary of some of the history of teabags making their way into Australia, tea bags have hugely impacted how people make tea and how popular it has become. There was a point when only a particular class of people would make and drink tea, but tea bags bridged a class gap. 

Not only were tea bags easier to use, but in the companies striving to become the number one, teas became less expensive because there was less prestige and niche. However, the arrival of tea bags also meant that the prominent tea company in Australia stopped being a local Australian company and eventually became a British one.

What Company Made the Frist Tea Bag?

Even with all the brands we discussed in this article, none of them is the first brand to come up with tea bags. The first tea bags were fabric bags and were originally part of a New York company run by Thomas Sullivan. Other companies then adapted tea bags once they saw how people enjoyed them, and other materials and designs came to be.

Conclusion

Tea bags became popular in Australia in 1926 since they were proper convenient to use than tea leaves. They’re a lot easier to clean up, and you don’t have to measure the specific amount of tea leaves for each cup. Tea companies needed to switch to tea bags to maintain their popularity.