JEDDAH, 11 August 2003 — The world’s first Lipton Zone Yellow tea shop has opened in Jeddah at the Iceland Mall on Prince Sultan Street. “This is the first Lipton Zone Yellow in the world,” Alex J. Andarakis the regional brand director of Unilever, which owns Lipton, told Arab News at the opening.

“We plan to expand our operations and open further tearooms throughout the GCC, however, we want to concentrate at the moment on Saudi Arabia as it is the biggest and most important market.”

“The Arab culture, is a heavy tea drinking culture, therefore we expect to do well. We are not only competing with other tea brands, but we are competing with the beverage market as a whole. Our biggest competitor is Pepsi. We are hoping that Zone Yellow will encourage the younger generation to drink tea.” Lipton Zone Yellow sells a variety of dishes in addition to the full line of Lipton products as well as some new products not before seen in Saudi Arabia. And yes, they do sell coffee too.