The earliest canned tea beverage developed in Japan was oolong tea, and the famous Japanese beverage companies Itohen and Suntory successively developed canned oolong tea beverages-this was 198 1 years ago.
It is worth noting that oolong tea drinks developed earlier than Japanese tea drinks. Canned Japanese tea drinks are on sale at 1985. Japanese tea has always been an indispensable tea for the Japanese, but at that time, China tea was unfamiliar to the Japanese. From the end of World War II to the normalization of diplomatic relations between China and Japan in 1972, the formal exchanges between the two countries were interrupted, and the Japanese rarely had the opportunity to understand the current situation (including culture) in China. After the normalization of diplomatic relations, the Japanese began to gradually understand the situation in modern China and get in touch with many things in modern China. In this situation, from 65438 to 0973, there was the first oolong tea craze in Japan. However, this craze soon cooled down.
In supermarkets and convenience stores in Japan, you can always see all kinds of canned tea drinks, including plastic bottles. Now these things have become indispensable things in Japanese life. Look at those people walking up and down the street. Many men, women and children take canned tea drinks to the streets. When they are thirsty, they drink this canned tea beverage to quench their thirst. This kind of drink is convenient to carry and reasonable in price, so it is becoming more and more popular in Japan. So when did this tea drink start to be sold in Japan?
However, in 1979, a popular female singer group in Japan once said, "We drink oolong tea to lose weight", which caused a great sensation and people's understanding of oolong tea was improved. Since then, canned oolong tea drinks have been on the market, and soon whiskey or shochu mixed with oolong tea has become popular, so oolong tea drinks have gradually become popular among Japanese people.
So how did the Japanese tea drink that the Japanese usually drink develop to the later? Japanese people always think that tea is brewed with tea sets at home, so it is difficult for people to accept canned tea drinks in concept or taste, and think that it is a waste to spend money on this drink. However, in the face of the arrival of canned oolong tea drinks, people's original view has been broken, thinking that "drinking canned tea drinks is also good." I think this is the contribution of oolong tea.
At that time, most people couldn't drink oolong tea brewed with tea at the scene and didn't know the taste. However, with the normalization of diplomatic relations between China and Japan, the Japanese want to absorb Japanese things in a warm welcome atmosphere, one of which is oolong tea. However, it is difficult for the Japanese to get the original leaves of oolong tea, and they don't know how to brew it. In this case, canned oolong tea drinks have just come into the market. As soon as people get the money, they can easily drink this drink and taste the taste of China tea. At the same time, they also found canned tea drinks convenient and delicious.
China tea and Japanese tea were originally brewed with tea leaves. However, it is more troublesome to make tea with a special tea set, and the cleaning after drinking is also more complicated. It happened that the invention of oolong tea beverage made them realize the convenience and other benefits of canned drinks. Since then, people have gradually accepted canned tea drinks.
Subsequently, 1985 began to develop and sell Japanese tea drinks. It is said that it is very difficult to develop Japanese tea beverage, because Japanese tea soup will turn brown after heating and sterilization, resulting in unsightly appearance, and unpleasant taste often appears during heating and sterilization. It will take them a long time to solve this problem. After the introduction, the sales of Japanese tea drinks are not good, because people are not used to the unique taste of canned Japanese tea drinks.
Later, with the upsurge of pursuing health, people gradually realized that various chemical components in Japanese tea were beneficial to health and became interested. Especially for the younger generation, there are not many teas at home, and you can easily buy canned drinks when you drink them. They began to get used to this convenient and convenient way of drinking. In addition, 1993 mixed tea was also listed one after another. They not only have tea, but also tea mixed with healthy raw materials such as coix seed. At this time, canned drinks are mainly plastic bottles. If you can't finish drinking a lid, you don't have to worry about leaking tea, which is convenient to carry. In this way, canned tea drinks, especially plastic bottles, became popular in Japan.
Japanese tea came from behind.
With the popularity of canned tea drinks, what changes have taken place in the circulation of tea? In the tea beverage industry, there is a concept called "beverage proportion", which describes the proportion of canned drinks in tea consumption. By analyzing the proportion of this beverage, we can know whether people drink tea brewed with tea leaves or buy canned drinks, as well as the increase or decrease of tea consumption. According to statistics, the conversion rate of oolong tea beverage is as follows: 65438+50.2% in 0999, 49.5% in 2000, 55438+0 in 2006, 56.8% in 2002, and then maintained at about 50%. On the other hand, in 2003, 30% of black tea and 14.9% of green tea.
Judging from the above figures, the proportion of oolong tea drinks is quite high. This means that when people drink oolong tea, half of them drink canned drinks. On the other hand, the chances of brewing and drinking with tea are much less than other teas. This may be that China tea has not been popularized among Japanese at present! It can also be said that oolong tea has not reached the level that everyone likes in Japan.
Some people point out that the main reason they drink canned oolong tea is to quench their thirst. The interesting fact is that in July and August, 2003, under the influence of Leng Xia, the sales of canned oolong tea drinks declined, while the sales of green tea and black tea drinks declined little. This means that many people prefer to drink Japanese tea or black tea, and finally choose oolong tea, from which it can be seen that they seem to drink oolong tea mainly to quench their thirst.
Therefore, beverage companies have tried their best to develop a variety of China tea drinks. For example, in 2002, canned green tea drinks entered the China market. However, these drinks almost disappeared soon. Don't they suit Japanese tastes? In 2007, Dahongpao canned drinks appeared; In 2008, there were even drinks from Laocong Narcissus and wuyi cinnamon. These dahongpao have become a topic because of their high grade, and the price is really shocking. In the same year, tea drinks with strong personality such as white tea, litchi oolong and champagne oolong were also sold.
In addition, in view of the improvement of health awareness, under the slogan of being beneficial to health (mainly to lose weight), high-content oolong tea polyphenols drinks have also been listed. In addition to these, there are jasmine tea, Tieguanyin and other teas. It seems that there are too many kinds of canned tea drinks on the market now.
When I returned to Japan this year, I observed that half of the canned tea drinks sold there were Japanese tea drinks, followed by black tea or mixed tea, and China tea, including oolong tea, was a minority. In convenience stores, this situation is different. Some convenience stores also sell drinks that cannot be seen in supermarkets, which are more colorful than supermarkets. This is because the customers of supermarkets are mainly housewives of all ages. They drink tea. Many people generally brew with tea leaves and occasionally buy canned tea drinks. Their beverage conversion rate may be lower.
On the contrary, the customers of convenience stores are mainly young people or single office workers. Their life is fast, convenient and fast, and the conversion rate of drinks seems to be relatively high. In order to meet their needs, convenience stores should also prepare more complete types of drinks.
Some people worry that the increase of canned tea drinks in the market will lead to the decrease of tea consumption. However, there is another view that the more canned tea drinks, the more tea raw materials are needed. In addition, people who never drink much tea may gradually become interested in tea itself after starting to drink canned tea drinks. If so many people like tea, isn't it a happy thing for people engaged in the tea industry?
In a word, canned tea drinks are indispensable in modern Japanese life.