Twinings

Twinings is a British tea company founded in 1706 by Thomas Twining (1675–1741) at 216 Strand, London. It is one of the world’s oldest continuously operating tea businesses and one of the most widely recognized tea brands internationally, associated with Earl Grey, English Breakfast, and a long heritage of blended teas sold across more than 100 countries. Twinings has been a holder of the British Royal Warrant for over two centuries and is now owned by Associated British Foods (ABF), which acquired the company in 1964.

In-Depth Explanation

Twinings occupies an unusual position in the tea world: it is simultaneously a historic institution with genuine documentary significance and a mainstream commercial brand whose supermarket presence can obscure that history. Its 300-year trajectory from a single London shop to a global mass-market operation traces the entire arc of British tea culture — the emergence of tea as a national beverage, the political battles over tea taxation, the invention of branded blends, and the eventual industrialization of the trade.

The Golden Lyon and the Strand Shop

Thomas Twining purchased Tom’s Coffee House at 216 Strand in 1706 and converted it from a coffee establishment to one selling dry leaf tea. This was a deliberate commercial differentiation: coffee houses of the era were largely male-only social venues, and Twining positioned his shop partly to serve women who could not enter traditional coffee houses. Selling packaged, dry tea to take away was unusual at the time — tea was more typically sold by grocers and merchants — and the Strand premises attracted a fashionable clientele from London’s legal and literary world.

The shop adopted the sign of the Golden Lyon, with two golden lions flanking a Chinese figure — an image that remains the basis of Twinings’ logo to this day. The 216 Strand address has been in continuous use since 1706, making it one of the longest-running retail premises in London. It now functions as a shop and small museum.

Richard Twining and the Commutation Act of 1784

The most politically significant Twining in the company’s history was Richard Twining (1749–1824), Thomas’s grandson. By the mid-18th century, tea duty in Britain had reached approximately 119%, producing one of the most extensive smuggling operations in English economic history: estimates suggest that by the 1780s, more tea was entering Britain illegally than through legitimate channels, with cheap, duty-evaded tea supplemented by adulterants including dried hedge clippings and spent leaves.

Richard Twining was a prominent voice in the campaign to address the smuggling crisis through tax reduction rather than enforcement. He corresponded with William Pitt the Younger and submitted arguments to Parliament in favour of dramatically cutting tea duties. The Commutation Act of 1784 reduced the duty on tea from approximately 119% to 12.5% — a reduction large enough to make legal tea cheaper than smuggled tea, effectively eliminating the commercial rationale for the illegal trade almost overnight. Legal tea imports surged. The Act is considered one of the most effective anti-smuggling measures in British fiscal history, and Richard Twining’s advocacy is consistently credited as a significant factor in its passage.

Earl Grey Tea

Twinings’ association with Earl Grey tea is the most commercially prominent aspect of its identity, though the origin story is partly legendary. The traditional account holds that Charles Grey (1764–1845), the 2nd Earl Grey and Prime Minister from 1830 to 1834, received a tea blended with bergamot orange oil — either as a diplomatic gift from China or as a recipe devised to suit the lime-heavy water of Howick Hall, his Northumberland estate. Twinings is said to have been asked to create a commercial version of this blend, which then became an enduring product.

No contemporaneous documentation of these events survives, and historians of tea treat the story as plausible but unverifiable. What is well established is that Twinings has been selling a bergamot-flavored black tea under the Earl Grey name for close to two centuries, and that their version became the commercial archetype that other producers benchmark against. The blend is now one of the most widely sold flavored teas in the world.

Royal Warrant

Twinings has held a Royal Warrant from the British Royal Family for over 200 years — one of the longest-running continuous Royal Warrant relationships of any company. The warrant was granted by King George II, and it has been renewed by successive monarchs. The warrant, which designates Twinings as a supplier to the Royal Household, is displayed on packaging and has been a significant marker of premium positioning throughout the company’s modern commercial history.

Acquisition by Associated British Foods

The Twining family managed the company through multiple generations from 1706 until 1964, when Associated British Foods (ABF) acquired it. Twinings now operates as part of ABF’s consumer brands division alongside Ovaltine and other food companies. Under ABF ownership the brand has expanded its global distribution substantially, though specialty tea enthusiasts often distinguish between Twinings’ heritage and the industrial-scale sourcing that characterizes its current mainstream product range.

History

1706: Thomas Twining purchases Tom’s Coffee House at 216 Strand, London, and begins selling dry leaf tea. The Golden Lyon sign is adopted.
1717: Thomas establishes the Golden Lyon as a dedicated tea shop, one of the earliest standalone retail tea operations in London.
1741: Thomas Twining dies; the business passes to his son Daniel Twining.
1784: Richard Twining (Thomas’s grandson) advocates for the Commutation Act, passed by Parliament under William Pitt the Younger, reducing tea duty from ~119% to 12.5% and effectively ending Britain’s tea smuggling industry.
1830s: Twinings begins selling a bergamot-flavored blend marketed as Earl Grey, named for Prime Minister Charles Grey; the exact origin of the blend is a matter of legend.
c. 1837: Twinings is granted a Royal Warrant by Queen Victoria; the company had earlier received warrants from George II and other monarchs.
1902: Twinings’ distinctive font-and-logo design — still in use — is registered.
1964: Associated British Foods acquires Twinings. The Twining family’s direct ownership ends after 258 years.
2000s–present: ABF expands Twinings into a global mass-market brand sold in supermarkets across more than 100 countries; the 216 Strand shop remains open as a heritage retail location and small museum.

Practical Application

For tea drinkers interested in Twinings’ historical range, the distinction between its core supermarket blends and its specialty and heritage lines is worth understanding. Twinings’ standard English Breakfast and Earl Grey are commodity-grade blended teas formulated for consistency and wide palatability — reliably drinkable but not designed for nuanced tasting. The company also produces a smaller range of single-origin and higher-grade teas that reflect more of the sourcing care associated with specialty tea, though these are less widely distributed.

For tracing the history of British tea culture, Twinings’ product archive and the Strand shop museum offer an accessible entry point. The Richard Twining–Commutation Act episode is particularly illuminating for understanding how commercial tea interests shaped public policy — a dynamic that recurs throughout tea’s political and economic history.

Common Misconceptions

“Twinings invented Earl Grey tea.”

The origin of Earl Grey is not documented with certainty. Twinings is the company most closely associated with commercializing and popularizing Earl Grey, but the blend’s origin — whether a Chinese diplomatic gift, an adaptation to local water, or something else — predates the first documented commercial version. Multiple companies now produce Earl Grey; Twinings’ claim is to the popularization and the archetype, not an unambiguous act of invention.

“Twinings is the oldest tea company in the world.”

Twinings is among the oldest surviving tea companies in Britain and likely the longest continuously operating at the same address (216 Strand since 1706). However, tea trading companies in China, Japan, and other producing countries predate Twinings by centuries. The “oldest” claim is appropriately understood as the oldest known Western retail tea business with a documented unbroken operating history.

“Twinings is a premium or specialty tea brand.”

The Twinings sold in most supermarkets globally is a mass-market blended tea product. Its heritage is real, but the brand’s current commercial category is mainstream, not specialty. Tea enthusiasts focused on single-origin, terroir-driven, or competition-grade teas generally consider Twinings a heritage institution rather than a quality benchmark by contemporary specialty standards.

Social Media Sentiment

r/tea: Twinings is discussed with a mix of affection and tempered expectations. Most posts acknowledge the heritage positively while noting that standard Twinings supermarket products are commodity blends. The brand comes up frequently in “gateway tea” discussions — many longtime enthusiasts describe Twinings Earl Grey or English Breakfast as the first tea they took seriously, before moving into specialty sourcing.
X/Twitter: Twinings occasionally trends in British tea culture discussions, usually around “proper cup of tea” debates or when Royal Warrant news surfaces. The brand has a loyal following among British expats who associate it with home.
YouTube: Features heavily in British tea culture videos, historical tea explainers, and “afternoon tea” content. Positive associations with British heritage dominate, though specialty tea channels often present it as a starting point rather than a destination.

Last updated: 2026-06

Related Terms

Research

Rappaport, E. (2017). A Thirst for Empire: How Tea Shaped the Modern World. Princeton University Press.
Summary: Provides social, political, and commercial context for Twinings’ role in British tea history, including the relationship between tea taxation, the Commutation Act, and the emergence of branded tea retail.

Forrest, D. (1973). Tea for the British: The Social and Economic History of a Famous Trade. Chatto & Windus.
Summary: Covers the 18th-century British tea trade including Richard Twining’s advocacy for the Commutation Act of 1784 and the consequences for smuggling and legal trade volumes.

Ellis, M., Coulton, R., & Mauger, M. (2015). Empire of Tea: The Asian Leaf that Conquered the World. Reaktion Books.
Summary: Traces tea’s journey from China to Britain, contextualizing Twinings’ early history within the broader political economy of the 18th-century tea trade and the social transformations tea produced in Britain.

Smith, W. D. (1992). Complications of the commonplace: Tea, sugar, and imperialism. Journal of Interdisciplinary History, 23(2), 259–278. https://doi.org/10.2307/205092
Summary: Academic analysis of tea and sugar’s roles in British consumption culture and colonial economics, relevant to the commercial context in which Twinings operated during the 18th and 19th centuries.