Steve S.
Yelp
I don't go here all that often because parking near Pike Place Market is usually an ordeal, and because I buy a whole pound of tea on each visit. It takes quite a while to use up a pound of tea, even if I measure it pretty strong. But I've been going here for years (long before I started doing Yelp check-ins), and it's a great little store.
They have all sorts of tea, from the ordinary (such as English breakfast) to the fairly exotic (such as my favorite, Lapsang souchong), decoratively displayed in bulk jars in the left side (as viewed from the entrance) of the store. The selection seems to be less comprehensive for herb teas. (But maybe I haven't looked closely.) That's not a problem for me; about the only herb tea I drink regularly is rooibos.
Hint: if you like drinking the same tea over and over, it's a good idea to buy a pound or more; they offer a discount for buying that much. But if you want to try something new, you can buy a small taster portion, and sometimes even taste samples in the store.
On the right side of the store, they have an assortment of tea accessories -- which I don't really need, since I've accumulated plenty of tea paraphernalia over the years.
I usually see the same friendly woman working there. I'm not sure whether she's the boss or just a long-term employee who works there when I'm likely to be there. But she knows her stuff about tea. Everyone else I've encountered there has too.
Minuses are the parking, but that's not their fault, and no public restroom, but they can give simple directions to a public restroom with cool tile floors. And once when I was desperate (from drinking too much tea) they let me use the employee restroom.
By the way, the reason I'm writing this today is that their chain store competitor Teavana just shut down. Yes, the little guys that have been there since 1995 beat the big guys.