12.15.08
Edible Austin tea party
posted by Nancy Murphy | 10 comments
I’m sitting in front of the fire with fuzzy socks on, waiting for my tea to brew, thinking about the first Edible Austin Tea Party this past weekend.
It was organized by Zhi Tea, one of the local tea vendors, as a benefit/community event, bringing together most of the tea vendors in Austin to show, sample, and sell their tea. The event was held in support of Edible Austin, which is a sustainable foods organization that teaches kids to grow food to sell and donate.
To me it was interesting and fun, but also amazing just because all of these companies are competitors, yet they are comfortable or confident enough to come together as a community. You don’t see that kind of thing happen very often in the corporate world, although that’s part of what I like to bring to the table.
But as I walked around and talked to people, some of whom I knew and some of whom I was meeting for the first time, and heard their stories about new things they were trying in their shops, or places they had been (like learning how to make tea in Taiwan), all I could think was, “I have to get my tea business going somehow. I need to really be a part of this.”
I’m sure it wouldn’t be all sunshine and lollipops, but who wouldn’t want to be able to spend a gorgeous Saturday afternoon in early December, in beautiful Austin, Texas, outside hawking your tea, and call it work? Of course, “hawking your tea” somehow sounds like you’re spitting, but you get the idea.
I want to be one of these people, who are brave enough and smart enough and lucky enough to make their dreams work. Work being the operative word–none of it would be possible without a lot of hard work. And even though I’ve taken the first steps toward making my dream a reality, I know it’s going to be a long, hard path, probably with more than a few detours and pauses along the way, based on the state of the economy and my need to support myself.
But just like they say “the first step is admitting you have a problem”; maybe I’ve already taken the first step just by acknowledging I have a dream. And jumping off the cliff into my sabbatical last year was a heck of a first step. As Butch Cassidy said, “Are you crazy? The fall will probably kill you!” But it hasn’t yet, so I’m hopeful that it won’t.
December 15th, 2008 at 12:02 pm
If you follow your vision and do what you love, the money will follow. Good luck Nancy.
December 15th, 2008 at 6:58 pm
Thanks for sharing your dream Nancy. You’re on your way.
December 16th, 2008 at 11:38 am
You’re going to do just fine. Raymond and I are excited for you.
December 16th, 2008 at 8:26 pm
Thanks, everyone! I appreciate your support.
December 17th, 2008 at 1:28 pm
Good luck Nancy! I’m cheering for you.
December 20th, 2008 at 12:46 pm
Nancy, we opened a second store (still own 20% of the first business/store from last year)
about 5 months ago..in this economy. We had no idea the big shoe would fall soon afterwards
re: the financial fiasco here. We are still growing and are around 400% growth from the first onth’s average daily sales, though still not ‘making money’ most days. Just building a business.
Our motto every day is to do better than we did the day before in quality of what we offer.
Ours is inside what was a coffeehouse for five years, so we also sell alot of coffee, but tea
is our ‘niche’ and it’s nice to have a mom come in and say her teenage son just called her on the cell to ask her to stop at ‘the tea shop’ and bring him home something. Yes, you can bet
it’s absolutely amazing to be around high quality teas all day, lovingly preparing them for people who are tea lovers or those converting from coffee to a healthier lifestyle. There’s passion, excitement, and so many, many nice people/customers. Maybe tea does that??
We hope we can get things to where we can make it through to profitability on a sustained basis because this truly is where we love being, with and around tea and ‘tea people’.
I remember what a very successful businesswoman who started her business in her garage with virtually no money once said: “If it is to be, it is up to me”.
December 20th, 2008 at 12:48 pm
P.S. Thanks for the great idea of getting together something like you had there in Austin.
We have been working on that and it’s an accomplishment for your city and the tea businesses there! Glad you got to experience it.
December 20th, 2008 at 12:52 pm
One more thought: There are so many of us who are ‘tea start-ups’ and, with two very smart PhD’s founding T-Ching, is there any possibility of other threads like this that might lead to alliances intra- or inter-state (or even country) that would benefit all of us? We just had a very
large tea importer approach us to license our technology, and are looking at other things to help growth, but don’t want to make wrong moves.
Maybe Sandy and Michelle could comment on this. There are a few companies who have
growth to double digit ‘chains’ in tea, and there are large organizations to join, but I’m talking about ideas possibly on co-branding, growth ideas, or maybe just plain sharing/mentoring
what works for us?
Just a thought. Kind of a grassroots thinktank.
December 21st, 2008 at 12:38 am
That is an excellent idea Team. We should all give this some thought and see what we can come up with. Michelle and I and Erika will discuss it and see what we can come up with. Maybe we can set aside one post a week as devoted to tea business. We can try and elicit more experienced industry people to right posts that offer tips and information running a successful tea business and encourage new people to write about their experiences and what has worked and not worked. That way we may be able to start a dialogue between all of us in the industry and how we can all work together to create win/win situations, encourage each other and network for types of partnering. Will follow up after we have discussed it more.
Any more thoughts you may have Team would be welcome, as well as anyone else that has some suggestions.
December 22nd, 2008 at 12:08 pm
Thank you, Sandy. Looking forward to seeing what you come up with! Surrounded by around 7 Starbucks within a mile’s distance (not to mention independent coffee place), we have to be special in all ways. I’m sure others have or will face such challenges as we all work to move specialty tea forward.