Tata Tea has shelved its plan to open tea parlours across the country.

"At present, we don't have any plans to set up tea parlours. Currently, we are just focusing on achieving a 10 per cent value share of the tea market by the end of next year," Vivek Mathur, vice-president (marketing), said.

Last year, after relaunching the Tata Tea brand, the company had expressed intentions of setting up tea parlours across the country in order to promote tea drinking.

Mathur added that the company has identified Tata Tea, Agni and Tetley as its three power brands. While Tata Tea already commands 8.4 per cent market share, the company is taking other initiatives to further drive growth by launching more variants under the brand.

He was speaking at the launch of one such variant -- Tata Tea Gold -- which is a blend of 85 per cent CTC and 15 per cent long leaf. The tea has been priced at Rs 45 for 250 grams and Rs 90 for the 500 grams pack.

Mathur said Tetley accounted for a minuscule 0.2 per cent share of the market. He also expressed possibility of launching iced tea under the Tetley brand sometime in future.

He, however, added that there were no immediate plans since the company was still studying the growth potential in the segment.

Tata Tea deputy managing director Percy Siganporia said the branded packet tea sales were declining by about 8 per cent every year because of the growth of regional brands as well as proliferation of brands of local retailers or bigger wholesalers.

Siganporia said the companies are therefore moving up the chain and positioning themselves on the upper segment of the popular class.

The total production of tea in India is 872-875 million kilograms. Company officials said while the share of the packet tea is declining, the overall consumption is increasing by 1-1.5 per cent every year.