How To Sell Tea Online From Home?

How to Sell Tea Online From Home

How To Sell Tea Online From Home

Side Hustling: Selling Tea Online

Sitting down for a delicious cup of hot tea is always a welcoming time of the day. Right behind water, tea is the most popular beverage in the world, enjoyed by billions.

Its health benefits, energizing effects, and taste have made tea the most popular beverage. Even avid coffee drinkers love a good cup of tea.

In the U.S. alone, 159 million people drink tea every day in 2020. By all accounts, the demand in the U.S. – which is already the third-largest tea importer in the world – continues to grow.

If you are passionate about drinking tea like most of the world, you just might be interested in selling tea online. With very minimal startup costs, you could start your own online tea business from home.

Editor's Note: We have an affiliated relationship with some of the resources listed. We receive a small commission for each purchase made at no additional cost to you.

How to Sell Tea Online from Home

Congratulations! If you are thinking about starting an online tea business, it can definitely be a rewarding challenge. It can also be an excellent side-hustle or a larger solo enterprise. As you know, there are so many different types of teas with wonderful flavors, aromatics, and health properties.

There are limitless ways to build a solid online brand with tea. Our guide will help you develop and start your online tea business from home.

Start with Your Tea Concept

This is the exciting part! The best way to start your online tea business is to determine what type of online tea store you want to be. You will also want to devise a way to set you apart from your competitors.

First, ask yourself, what type of teas would you like to sell? Perhaps you would like to sell teas with soothing properties that can help your customers detox, destress, or reduce overall anxiety. Or you might have a special caffeinated flavored blend that invigorates.

Your tea products will put you in a specific niche with specific customers. From there, you can develop your online tea brand around that.

If you need help deciding which direction to take, consider what’s already out there. Do a quick internet search of other tea brands and online tea stores. Those you find will likely be your competitors. What types of teas are they selling? Consider offering a new tea product to make your online tea store stand out.

Decide Why Your Tea Store Will Be Special

Why will customers buy your tea?

Think about how you want your tea to be served and for what reason. Do you want to focus on teas as health remedies? Do you want to focus on fruity and delicious cold tea blends for summer and special occasions? For starters, find a tea beverage that you love to drink and share that passion with your customers.

Decide on Your Tea Brand

To stand out among your competitors, you want to have a catchy brand and a good name. The name of your online tea store will immediately impact how potential customers feel about you.

As we have previously recommended with starting an online coffee store, develop a tea brand and name that is clear, easy to spell, and memorable.

Your name will be a part of your larger brand. Your logo, slogan, color, and packaging will work in combination to influence the perception of your online tea store.

Setup Your Online Tea Business With Your State

You will need to create your business entity to buy your inventory at wholesale costs and resell your tea. You will most likely need to apply and register your tea business within your state.

Creating a business entity, an LLC, for example, will allow you to apply for your EIN (Employee Identification Number) with the IRS. This number will be important for you to open bank accounts and file taxes. Additionally, you will want to apply for and receive a business license from your state, which can also provide you with a reseller’s license.

An LLC, a business license, and a reseller’s license are not the same. To be a legit online tea company, you will need each of these.

To find out more, simply Google how to open a business in your state and click on the link directly tied to the state government’s website.

Set Up Your Online Tea Store

You will need a website and a Shopping Cart. 

It’s easier than ever to set up your online tea store. Your online tea store will allow your customers to find you, shop, and process payment transactions securely.

Your modern and easy-to-navigate website will be your storefront where customers can buy your tea products. While you can hire a full-time web designer or a freelancer, we think that you can save hundreds or even thousands of dollars and set up your website yourself.

The easiest and fastest way to set up your online store is through Shopify. Shopify does everything for you. It provides you with several website designs to choose from and sets up your online shopping cart.

The next way is to set up a WordPress site through a hosting company. While it may take a little more time to set up, you can save quite a bit annually using WordPress. To set up your website, read our article, How to Start an Online Coffee Business.

Two options to set up your store:

•       All-in-one Website Store with Shopify
•       Website Hosting

Whether you use Shopify, you will want to pick a website theme – your website's outer skin. Your theme will generate the look and feel of your site.

Creating your own website may seem daunting, but consider the time, effort, and money you would spend setting up your physical tea shop. How much time and money would you put into finding the right location, signing a lease, building out your store, and hiring employees? 

Setting up your online tea store is only a tiny fraction of what you would be paying if you set up a traditional brick-and-mortar store.

Take the first step:  Once you settle on your company’s name, set up your website using Shopify.

Let's Find Your Online Tea Customers

To determine who your customers are, you will want to do some basic market research. The good news is researching your future tea customers may not cost anything except time and flex your creativity.

For starters, consider all facets of tea drinkers and tea consumers. Look at the existing product lines available. What are tea drinkers interested in right now?

Do you want to sell individual tea bags or loose-leaf tea that your customers can put into a tea diffuser? Do you want to create ready-to-drink tea blends that are not being served now? Maybe you want to create a monthly subscription box of healthy, soothing teas for immune-compromised consumers?

Whichever product line you choose, you first want to know who you are selling to. Your target audience will impact your product offering. There might be some segments of the local markets that are underserved. For example, there might be a need for natural herbal teas or exotic fruity flavors that are not sold in your area. Brainstorming about product offerings and customers’ needs will help develop your tea products and shape your marketing plan.

We’ve come up with some tips to help you determine your tea-drinking customers:

Use Social Media to Reach Tea Lovers

Utilize social media to gauge what people are into at the moment. Search various tea hashtags on Instagram, such as:

#homebrewtea

#teaathome

#Ilovetea

See what comes up and then jump around from there. Social media is great because you can see who your target market can be – and who your competitors are. From here, you might also decide to change your product offerings altogether depending on what is trending.

Analyze the Online Tea Competition

Who else is selling tea online?

Find out what your competitors are offering and what they are doing to engage with their customers. Try to learn as much about their customers as possible. You can do this by looking at the types of teas they are offering. You can read their tea descriptions on their shopping page. Look at their prices, shipping costs, and packaging.

Finally, you might also be able to read customer reviews and find out what they like about the products.

Assessing Your Tea

When marketing your online tea company, ask yourself two questions:

•       Why should customers buy your tea?
•       What benefits does your tea provide that others don’t have?

Make a list of all the benefits your tea offers. Determine who would most benefit from teas like this. Would your teas be most beneficial for those who are trying to detox or reduce inflammation? Would your teas be more in line for people trying to lose weight and want a low-calorie beverage alternative? Will your teas serve tea connoisseurs who drink only fermented Pu-erh?

Look at demographics: Think about who will be buying your specific tea. Fine-tuning your demographic research is an ongoing effort you can learn more about by offering surveys on your website or social media accounts.

Consider what your target market values. What lifestyle choices are they making? For example, are your customers into nature, yoga, and sustainable living? If so, how can you change your brand, packaging, and content to better align with your customers?

Once you have a good idea of who you want to reach, it will be a good time to find your tea inventory.

Find Your Tea Inventory

As you set out to build your tea brand and build your tea website, you also want to find your inventory source or sources.

That is, you will want to establish relationships with wholesale tea sellers. Wholesale tea sellers are tea companies that sell their tea wholesale to companies, such as coffee shops, cafes, and other online retailers, like yourself.

Which wholesale tea suppliers will you choose?

Several wholesale tea sellers can make your life about selling a lot easier. You want to choose a wholesaler that will support your vision and work with you as you grow. Be mindful that it may take some time to gain a little customer traction when you get started. While tea has a good shelf life, you want to ensure that you send out the freshest and most fragrant teas possible. Having a giant wholesale tea order as you first start your online tea store may leave you with a lot of stale inventory.

Develop Your Tea Product Line

Now, here’s the exciting part! It’s time to start developing the tea products your customers love.

You want to create a tea brand that customers will also share on their social media accounts. In today’s heavy social media environment, this is one of the best ways to market your product. It’s easy to see why each tea product in your product line should have a catchy name and be memorable.

Flavored Teas and Blends – Aromatic blends of teas create some delicious flavor profiles. Developing your own unique blends and curating your own taste to serve customers is an added value.

Single Origin Teas – Single origin teas offer wonderful and clean taste profiles. In addition to some healthy or medicinal properties, single-origin teas would make a great addition to your product line.

Herbal Teas – All-natural organic herbal teas like chamomile, mint, raspberry leaves, nettle, lavender are the latest trend among those who value natural remedies for all kinds of physical and mental conditions. Besides, they are just very aromatic and pleasant to drink.

Tea Inventory – You might want to offer various appliances to brew and serve teas. From kettles to matcha tea bowls and whisks to tea ceremony sets – decide what your potential customers will be interested in while doing your market research.

How to Sell Tea Online From Home

Don't Miss: 10 Easy Steps to Selling Coffee Online From Home

Design Your Online Tea Packaging

When selling tea online, your packaging will be a big part of your marketing strategy. Your tea packaging will not only be a part of your customer’s first impression of your online tea business but can also help generate further sales.

Your tea packaging can add to your customer’s overall experience. The better the experience, the more likely they will buy again.

You may want to think out of the box regarding your tea packaging. Consider new and interesting containers to hold your tea. While various tea sellers use pouches, others will use tins or cardboard boxes. When you are just starting your online tea website, you may want to experiment with various packaging first to see which generates more sales.

Effective Tea Packaging Tips:

Use Bright Colors: Fishes go after bright shiny objects for a reason. The movement and color of bright flashiness attract them even in the darkest of waters. With that said, consider using color in your tea packaging. Be bright and bold.  For more information on using colors in marketing, check out the psychology of colors.

Your Containers: Choose a tea bag and outer container that complements your brand and name. People will pay attention to your containers and overall packaging. Their unboxing experience is all part of the fun – make it memorable! Look at packaging examples on Pinterest.

Marketing Your Online Tea Store

As an online tea seller, your job is to promote the benefits of buying your tea and selling as much as possible.

You will want to market your online store in any way that reaches your ideal customer. There are plenty of ways and places to promote your product, but they won’t do any good unless it is directed at your target market. Stay focused on your customer in the entire process.

How to Promote Your Online Tea Store:

Social Media

I am sure that you will choose the social media platforms you are most comfortable with. My recommendation is that you choose the social media platform that best reaches your customers.

Videos

Having videos is great because they are easily shareable and easy to consume.

A Tea Blog

While not completely falling out of fashion, blogs are still often under-utilized. Perhaps because they take time to write, it’s hard to determine whether they lead to conversions. Yet, your blog posts will not only help you with SEO develop your credibility, but they will also provide you with interesting content that draws in your customers.

Face-to-face marketing

You can’t underestimate the power of face-to-face marketing. Telling people what you sell, sharing business cards and hand-shakes, and selling at farmer’s markets are all compelling marketing techniques.

Email marketing

Email marketing is still the most effective way to deliver conversions. Consider signing up for an email marketing service like ConvertKit.

How to Sell Tea Online From Home

Benefits of Selling Tea Online From Home

We have covered a lot of ground in this article so far. If you are still on the fence about selling tea online with your own website, let’s review some of the benefits.

Flexible Schedule – Whether you have a full-time job or other things going on in your life, you can run your online tea business on your schedule. Some weeks you will have more time than others.

24/7 Shopping – Your online tea store is open all day – every day. This makes the possibility of making money when you are sleeping or working your regular 9-to-5. There’s no feeling quite like waking up in the morning to discover that you’ve made money while dreaming!

Low-cost Barrier – Starting an online tea store has a relatively nominal cost. This means you can build out your business at your pace and budget. However, the low-cost barrier to entry means that many other possible players can jump into the game.

Additional tea retailing questions:

What is the best feeling about starting your online tea business?

Starting your own online business creates plenty of emotions. However, I would say that getting your first sale beats them all. It is truly an amazing feeling when you start your online tea business and you get your first sale from an anonymous customer.

What should I look out for when I sell tea online?

Jumping into an e-commerce business can bring lots of success and financial rewards. It can change your entire lifestyle. But success doesn’t generally happen overnight. Starting an online tea business will be challenging. It will take work and devotion. To reduce your frustration, give yourself a liberal timeline to make your first sale. Dedicate yourself, be patient, and always try your best.

My second recommendation is that you try to keep your inventory costs low. You will need to spend money and time investing in your tea website, brand, and shipping materials. But most of the cost after that will be your inventory. Plan for slow and steady growth until you are running on all cylinders.

Promoting The Health Benefits of Drinking Tea

Tea is well-known to be a healthy beverage. The great thing about selling your tea is knowing you are offering something to benefit your customers.

As an online tea seller, you will want to push, push, and push the benefits of your tea – in addition to its taste.

Every communication should deliver to your customers yet another reason to buy your tea.

Excellent Customer Service Will Drive Sales

At the end of the day, three things will help you sell more tea:

•   Your Product Line
•   Marketing
•   Customer Service

We’ve talked about your tea products and marketing. Let’s briefly turn to customer service.

The type of VIP service you give to your customers nearly guarantees repeat business. It’s the repeat business that will make your online tea business profitable. You know more than anybody that customers want to feel valued. Deliver the type of customer service that allows your customer to feel your deep gratitude. This means answering emails or shipping out orders as quickly as possible.

For more information on increasing your online tea sales, read our recent article, How to Increase Online Coffee Sales.

How To Sell Tea Online From Your Home

Learning how to sell tea online from your home can be a rewarding challenge. Whether you want to have a part-time job or take steps to create your own full-blown tea company, you can start here.

Let me summarize the steps we’ve just discussed:

• Pick Your Online Tea Store Concept
• Decide What Will Make You Special
• Pick Your Brand
• Setup Your Business Entity
• Setup Your Online Tea Website (With Shopify)
• Find Your Customers
• Use Social Media
• Analyze the Competition
• Analyze Your Tea
• Find Your Tea Inventory
• Develop Your Tea Product Line
• Develop Your Tea Packaging
• Market Your Online Tea Store
• Benefits of Selling Tea
• Promote Your Healthy Tea
• Customer Service Will Drive Sales

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