What genuinely costs money to produce
Hand plucking, and particularly plucking only buds and the first leaf, is labour-intensive and shows up directly in price. Small-lot processing by a skilled maker costs more than volume production. Early spring harvests are scarcer than later ones. Long ageing under controlled conditions ties up capital for years. All four of these change what is in the cup and all four are legitimately expensive.
What costs money and does not reach the cup
Packaging, brand, retail margin, small-format tins, and the several intermediaries between garden and shelf. A tea sold in a beautiful caddy in a city centre may be the same lot as one sold in a foil pouch by a direct importer at half the price. None of this is dishonest; it is simply not tea.
Reputation, which is both
A famous origin — a named mountain, a protected appellation — carries a premium that is partly real scarcity and partly the name. The best material from a famous place is genuinely exceptional and genuinely rare. The ordinary material from the same place is ordinary and still carries some of the premium, which is where most overpaying happens.
Where the value usually is
Freshness and correct storage, which are cheap. Buying smaller quantities more often, particularly for green tea. Unfashionable regions and unfashionable seasons, where the same care produces a fraction of the price. And second and third infusions, which cost nothing and are where a good leaf earns its money back.
A test worth running
Buy a modest tea and an expensive one from the same category and brew them side by side, the same way, on the same day. Most people find the gap is real and much smaller than the price difference, and that it narrows further once the cheaper tea is brewed properly. That result is worth more than any amount of reading about quality.