Why Doesn't Tea Have a Futures Market?

Coffee has traded futures since 1882 and cocoa since the 1920s. Tea, which outsells them both, has never had one, anywhere. The reason is not price stability. It is that no two lots of tea are the same thing.

How the Tea Trade Works

The canonical map of the tea business, from garden to auction to shelf. What tea is as a commodity, the path the leaf takes to the cup, how its price is set, and where the money along the way actually ends up.