It's the tempest that's not in a teapot; younger Brits have switched to tea bags, reportedly because they can't spare the five minutes it takes to brew a pot of loose tea. Demand for loose tea is down, and sales of teapots in the U.K. have plunged by two thirds as a result.

British culture is steeped in tea, so it's kind of a shock to learn that 96 percent of the tea drunk in Britain is now brewed from tea bags. Tea consumption's actually on the rise, but those between the ages of 18 and 40 consider teapots, cups, and saucers "quaint, dainty and old-fashioned."

Edward Bramah, the founder of the Bramah Museum of Tea and Coffee in London, disapproves of the current trend. "Orthodox tea has flavour and is delectable and delicious," he told the Telegraph. "But today I would suggest that the British don't know anything about tea."

In our household, loose tea definitely rules; of the thirty or so teas we keep on hand, roughly twenty are loose. To us, loose tea clearly tastes better, and is well worth a bit of extra effort. But in Britain, the future looks bleak for teapot manufacturers; you can read it in the tea leaves, if you can find any.