Could tea by the unlikely savior of Starbucks Corporation (NASDAQ: SBUX)? The company unveiled three new full-leaf tea lattes on January 3. Each of them uses the new fat full-leaf Tazo tea bags; a tea-drinking experience rarely found in coffee shops. And they're good.

While some may have thought the green tea latte idea was odd at best, disgusting at worst (I'll raise my hand here), these new tea lattes are a pleasant balance of flavors and a totally different experience than Starbucks' overpowering coffee drinks and super-sweet blended drinks. I ordered the London Fog tea latte yesterday, a mix of Earl Grey-style tea, vanilla syrup (I ordered it with 1/3 the regular amount of vanilla syrup), and steamed milk, and it was frothy and lovely. The other two options, Black Tea and Vanilla Rooibos, are essentially the same concept with different tea blends (the Rooibos is caffeine-free), and both seem popular, too.

I'd resisted the concept at first, but soon my Twitter stream was flooded with Starbucks customers in love with the London Fog. (For the record, plenty of people think it tastes terrible too, but the lovers seem to be in the majority.) Both other new tea lattes, and the fruit-tea infusions, are getting good reviews all over.

Could this be Starbucks' savior? Perhap. The tea lattes, essentially branding the drink the British and Indian people have perfected over centuries, are a great way to open the chain up to a different sort of experience for all-day visitors and customers who want to meet friends at Starbucks but don't drink coffee. Now, instead of ordering the cheapest drink on the menu, coffee avoiders can find something special (and pricey) to call their own. Those of us who like coffee in the morning and tea in the afternoon can cozy up to the London Fog. It's a smart move, and one that could develop into a game changer should Starbucks handle the training well. I'm cautiously optimistic that Starbucks' future is (partly) steeped in tea.

Starbucks (SBUX) CFO Michael Casey in Wednesday's conference call: While this [service slowdown] is an issue, and we're working on it, and we're going to get it solved, it perhaps doesn't quite deserve the focus it's been getting" from Wall Street. [via Forbes.com]. Fair enough, but controlling what the Street chooses to focus on is not easy. I'm surprised at that the play that that issue has received, I can only assume that there must be some value to holding it as a concern, because I haven't noticed lines increasing myself. Or am I already so indoctrinated I don't notice time spend in line any more (as we say out here in the sticks-- or on line as they say in NYC). It seems upper management is aware of the situation -- I almost wrote, hyper-aware, but seeing that it is such an issue for many analysts, I suppose they can't be overly concerned about it.

Come to think of it, I've walked out of joints with slow service plenty.