That's because of sea level rise from global warming. Lots of isles have been shrinking.

I've been in the US for ~2 years now. The tea isle at Safeway has done nothing but grow.

There are even loose leaf pay-per-pound options now!

> tea isle

That's Great Britain.

You meant the tea aisle :-)

Yes, consumer grade teas are disappearing from big chain supermarket aisles. But over here, the rise and rise of boutique specialty tea stores as well as online tea stores just keeps going.

As another poster mentioned above, there is a whole world of tea outside of the big brand 'English Breakfast' or 'Earl Grey'.

Personally one of my biggest enjoyments is blending various teas to see what sort of flavours I can create. Always leaf, never tea bags!

I'd suggest that anyone complaining about tea go and learn how to make it properly: http://www.h-tea-o.net/newsletter/G001DouglasAdams/teatalk/ :)