Today a cup of tea is the cheapest comfort in Britain. In 1657, it was one of the most expensive. This is the story of tea's first foothold in London — and what it cost.
A coffee house called Garraway's
Thomas Garway began selling tea at Garraway's Coffee House in London in 1657. Tea arrived as a Chinese luxury, strange and precious — and Garway was among the first to put a price on it.
The price of luxury
The price ran 16 to 50 shillings per ounce — roughly a worker's weekly wage at the low end, and a monthly wage at the high end. Tea was not a drink; it was a display of wealth.
One cup, fifty to one hundred fifty pounds
Put in today's money, a single cup brewed from that tea would cost roughly £50 to £150. Imagine paying that for your morning cuppa.
From royal luxury to daily habit.
From rarity to ritual
From those beginnings — a luxury sold in a coffee house to the wealthy — tea traveled the long road to becoming Britain's daily habit. Every affordable cup today carries that history.