In early December I was in downtown Calgary, and headed into Banker’s Hall for a bite of lunch. There used to be a great sushi place in there, but it looks like when the whole mall area got renovated, the sushi place left, because it’s no longer there. (The pretty stationary place is gone too…)
- TotaliTea in Banker’s Hall
However, while looking at the mall map, I found another place to check out – TotaliTea on the third level across from the food court. It’s an attractive store, with tins of tea behind the counter, but a small selection of jars to ‘sample’ (look at and sniff) on the floor along with loads of tea pots, cups, and other accessories. I’l admit that the only thing that sort of put me off was the tea cozies on the shelves, and the large pillar near the front door that obscures the sight of the tins – I wanted to visit a tea shop – and without the tins, I wasn’t nearly as interested.
TotaliTea's sample jars
Luckily of course, I did see the tins, and subsequently the small jars with the samples!
The samples are all in different jars which is kind of unusual, and there aren’t a LOT of varieties compared to some of my other favorite tea shops, but still a lot of nice teas. There are sections for black, oolong, green, rooibos, and fruit infusions
TotaliTea's sample jars
I ended up picking up just one package of tea – a 50 gram package of Black Current tea. I wasn’t especially thrilled to see that they were pre-packaged. I don’t know why, but pre-packaged tea gives me the feeling of it being less fresh – which I know is silly. It’s not like ground coffee or something! After one not-so-great experience with a “new” (to me!) tea shop, I only try small amounts of new things now – hopefully this will be delicious though – it certainly smells wonderful!
TotaliTea in Banker's Hall
They also have a large selection of flowering teas, and some bagged teas like these Mighty Leaf teas at the front of the shop. I also noticed that they had a LOT of the same teas I’ve seen elsewhere, so my guess is that they’re using the same distributors as other small tea places.
really cute little pufferfish teapot at TotaliTea in Banker's Hall
Check out this adorable pufferfish tea pot!
The prices seemed quite reasonable – along the same lines as other tea shops. My 50 grams of tea was $5.50 tax included (which is just a little less than something similar from David’s Tea or Teaopia) and just slightly more than the same tea available at the Banff Tea Company. Their tea pots and other accessories also seemed to be comparably priced. Oddly enough, the price was different in the store than online (where the same tea is $9.00 for 100 grams,which should have worked out to $4.50 + 5% GST). I find that a little strange.
Totalitea
Unit 336 315 – 8th Ave SW, Calgary, Alberta,
T2P 4K1 Canada
Opposite the food court on +30 Level
tel: 403-266-6567
