Coffee Excels with Tea: Stories from a Shifting Market

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By Suzette Hammond 

“I don’t think tea has even begun to be retailed and presented properly,” says Bo Nelson of Kansas City’s Thou Mayest Coffee. His point has not been entirely lost on the North American tea industry. 

Industry leaders have been discussing the modernization of tea retailing for a decade. Meanwhile, a seismic shift is underway not in the tea rooms but in coffee shops where tea is no longer looking like a sad, stagnant status quo, but rather an inspiring blank canvas of possibility. 

A short ride away from the Las Vegas Convention Center, where the World Tea Expo is held each year, is the welcoming patio of Makers & Finders in the arts district. If you Google “best Las Vegas coffee,” they top the list. However, their menu holds hidden tea gems, as well. Numerous matcha bar offerings, including a creatively named Matcha Americano (simply, a normal 2oz serving of matcha, but with added hot water to bring it to “tea-like” consistency for the matcha newbies) and cold brew Thyolo black tea from Satemwa Tea Estate in Malawi. Their tea supplier? Tealet, a local Vegas importer specializing in curated, small lot selections . all directly traded with smallholder producers. This is a scene that the observant coffee and tea enthusiast will see playing out at quality cafes across the US. Indeed it may very well be coffee that will firmly steer the conversation, creativity, and expectation for tea for years to come. 

“The challenge in coffee environments is that tea is often an afterthought, as coffee takes center stage,” explains Jonathan Riethmaier of Mammoth Espresso, in New Orleans. His tea partners are Jojo Tea from Miami and White2Tea based in Yunnan, China. “When this happens, you see a lot of clumsy tea programs, where the space isn’t designed to accommodate tea service, or existing coffee equipment is repurposed for tea. 

“I think often in coffee spaces, we ask our tea suppliers to make things easy for us - to create a turnkey solution,” said Riethmaier. “For that reason you see a lot of tea companies conveying tea selection and preparation in the simplest possible terms to coffee professionals. I didn’t want easy - I wanted right. When I first met the team at Jojo Tea, I recognized immediately that we were speaking the same language,” he said. 

The alignment of a tea program directly with the values of the coffee program is a common theme that comes up for coffee professionals who enjoy a flourishing tea program. Nelson says that Thou Mayest leverages, “the same structure we use for our coffee, beer, and cocktail program: core products and flagships that are always available for a reasonable price and easily accessible. Seasonals that change and keep the ‘nerds’ engaged, and micro-lots and one-offs that delight and surprise. 

“I love getting comments from customers thanking us for caring about tea and taking it seriously,” says Nelson. 

Greater Goods is a roaster in the community of Dripping Springs, Texas, just outside of Austin. Their impressive commitment to doing right by coffee includes having a team of certified baristas, roasters, and two Q-graders. Co-founder Khanh Trang also sees the very deep ways that tea mutually supports a quality coffee program – and that customers see this easily, too. 

“It was our coffee consumers who kept requesting a tea program that got our ball rolling,” says Khanh. “I believe that the customers who seek out uniqueness of the different coffees will also go seek out specialty teas. They’re looking for a different kind of sensory experience, just like that person who seeks out a farm-to-table dining experience.” 

Nelson’s company, Thou Mayest, works with Spirit Tea from Chicago - both are located in the Midwest, but not exactly the same market. In a similar example, if one browses at the “Our Partners” website listing for another boutique tea company lighting it up in the coffee world – Song Tea of San Francisco – you find roasters up and down the West Coast in their portfolio. Not just San Francisco. With so much emphasis on “local” in the craft food and beverage world, how do your neighborhood roasters explain their not-so-neighborhood tea? Or does it matter? Maybe not as much as one might assume. Spirit Tea, now three years old, has loyal customers far beyond the midwest. 

“I think that whole ‘local’ thing is important, but more than that, we really care about the excellence of consistent service and product. I see so many trying to take the path of least resistance and, in the end, the consumer loses,” says Nelson. “I think hard work and committed relationships beats out ‘local’ any day. Also, let’s be honest, there is nothing remotely ‘local’ about coffee and tea.” 

Greater Goods turns to TeaSource in Minneapolis for most of their loose leaf tea. “TeaSource has been great to work with for an all around selection of teas,” says Khanh. “They helped by providing us with the never ending samples of teas until we got what we needed for our shop, always available to answer any questions we might have about any of their offerings.” 

Riethmaier says of Mammoth’s tea partners, “There are many companies that can sell you tea, but what I found compelling about the suppliers we work with is their willingness to provide us with information that helps us sell tea in store. What is the history behind a particular tea? Why is this process notable? How did it get this name? These are questions we ask in order to tell a complete story to our customers and engage them beyond tasting notes.” 

The more information you can learn about your teas, the more naturally creativity flows. Tea lattes beyond the standard London Fog are popping up with greater frequency. Just a short list of some tasty highlights from around the US: 

  • Greater Goods turned their rose dark tea (similar type to pu’er) into a deeply perfumed latte.
  • Attendees at this year’s SCA conference in Seattle who took their afternoon break around the corner at Anchorhead may have caught a stunningly delicious tea beverage from their menu: pistachio matcha latte, with homemade pistachio infused milk.
  • Cold brewed sparkling tea on tap is served at Intelligentsia in Chicago. • Go Get Em Tiger in LA’s Larchmont neighborhood serves a hopped up and carbonated Yunnan black tea.
  • Earlier this year, Rishi Tea released a limited line of craft brews in 5-gallon recyclable kegs.
  • Spirit Tea develops recipes for serving sparkling teas on tap with some of their wholesale accounts.
  • Chicago’s The Coffee Studio has a menu of house-made tea cocktails to complement their loose leaf tea program from Kilogram. 

Such bold beverage statements in the marketplace are finally, truly, freeing up coffee shop owners to think about tea in a way that goes against old school assumptions of yesteryear. 

“I had assumed that we needed to keep a few pretty basic teas on the menu and some tisane blends that would appeal to a broader audience,” said Riethmaier. The menu initially included all the teas I really wanted to feature, plus some more introductory teas that would seem more familiar to the casual tea drinker. 

“What I immediately realized is that our ‘premium,’ or higher cost teas, were clearly our best performers. That insight gave me the confidence to invest in higher quality and adventurous teas,” he adds. 

Even in the land of Southern sweet tea, the greater shift in awareness of flavor exploration has enabled Mammoth Espresso to share beautiful pu’er cakes (beeng cha) and other treasures in their rotation of around 15 specialty teas. 

“Tea is so incredibly technical and ceremonial, like where specialty coffee brewing is now,” says Khanh. “The different types of tea brewing apparatuses plus time, temperature and water are all key components to preparing a beautiful cup of tea - very similar to coffee brewing on the slow bar.”

The takeaway advice from these coffee experts? Just go for it. Riethmaier says: “If we assume that tea is inherently complicated, is that not also true of coffee? Is that not true of cultivating the customer experience? These are all complicated aspects of a retail environment. The difference is our familiarity with one versus another.” 

Khanh makes a similar observation. “There’s a belief that if you expect your consumers to be able to taste the quality in your coffee, why would you not expect them to taste the quality in the teas.” Identifying your priorities and needs before you dive in too deep will also improve your chances of success. 

The points that caught Nelson’s eye when he started talking to suppliers were very simple. “Good selection. Consistent products. Training. Quick shipping. Easy ordering. Those are what get my attention as a retail owner. Solve problems for me, don’t give me more.” Nelson also says any tea program has got to be profitable and “fit your ‘why’.” 

“Brand alignment in values and presentation is so important to make sure the product is being used to its fullest potential, not to mention the synergy of strong partnerships,” he said. 

Riethmaier emphasizes the importance of doing your homework and getting to know various tea suppliers and what they can do for you. He also recommends finding independent resources to keep in your toolkit, including books such as “Tea: A User’s Guide”, released this year by World of Tea’s Tony Gebely. Online tea training is also a great option. One such program, World Tea Academy, now has nearly as many international students as domestic, showing the steady interest in vetted tea education. Independent tea consultants can also assist you with training needs (not all tea companies are able to provide onsite training), beverage development, menu selection, and vendor introductions. 

“Allow your knowledge of coffee to guide you just enough to get your bearings, and then understand that the world of tea is wonderfully distinct. Interview numerous tea suppliers to find someone you can relate to and who can help you build your tea program,” says Riethmaier. 

He says “The great opportunity for coffee shops is that, generally, if they invest heavily in quality tea they will almost assuredly be the bright spot in their market.”