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In 2015, the media became obsessed with one man’s attempts to grow tea in the Scottish Highlands. 

The BBC profiled him on the One Show. Radio reporters flocked to interview him. Even the Chinese national news agency reported his work. 

Tam O’Braan (as he was then known) was the first to ever sell Scottish tea, and the press went wild. 

Fornum and Mason bought his leaves. The Dorchester created a new Scottish tea-tasting menu. Barack Obama reportedly tried his tea, and the Queen loved it.

Tam’s business started bringing in hundreds of thousands of pounds. But soon his lies began to unravel.

Today, with Jaega Wise, we tell the story of the Scottish tea scandal. We explain how Tam O’Brann fooled the world and the psychology behind why so many customers believed him.

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Listen to the BBC Food Program’s show on the scandal: https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/m002mn01

Learn more about Jaega: https://www.jaegawise.com/ 

Unlock the Nudge Vaults: https://www.nudgepodcast.com/vaults

Join 10,828 readers of my newsletter: https://www.nudgepodcast.com/mailing-list 

Connect on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/phill-agnew/ 

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Today’s sources: 

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Langer, E. J., Blank, A., & Chanowitz, B. (1978). The mindlessness of ostensibly thoughtful action: The role of “placebic” information in interpersonal interaction. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 36(6), 635–642.

Mackie, D. M., Worth, L. T., & Asuncion, A. G. (1990). Processing of persuasive in-group messages. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 58(5), 812–822.

Maier, L., Schreier, M., Baccarella, C. V., & Voigt, K.-I. (2023). University knowledge inside: How and when university–industry collaborations make new products more attractive to consumers. Journal of Marketing.

Peterson, R. A., Kim, Y., & Jeong, J. (2019). Out-of-stock, sold out, or unavailable? Framing a product outage in online retailing. Journal of Marketing Theory and Practice.