One year ago, I quit my job to focus on the tea company I co-founded with no experience in tea industry, business or marketing. Fast-forward 1 year and our story made it to Forbes Magazine. AMA!

What was the biggest eye opener when starting your own business?

Probably the fact that it wasn’t as smooth of a road as I imagined it to be, and that particular eye opening moment came after 2 months of running our business without any income. From hearing success stories from other brands and how easy it seemed to be, I imagined that all of our products would be sold within the first week of launching. But, it didn’t quite work out as we imagined.

Hi,

Could you shed some light on your marketing strategy? E.g. what mediums did you use to advertise? How effective were they? How did your marketing strategy change over time?

Thanks!

Anything from personally handing out informational flyers at the middle of an intersection in Downtown L.A. to walking inside Yoga studios and speaking to the Yoga instructors and their students. Furthermore, we even did door-to-door marketing to spas in the greater Los Angeles area. Also ranging from getting Instagram posts from Instagram accounts that have over million followers to Google and Facebook Ads.

The most effective method of marketing came, when we sent our products to people who gave their honest opinion. Whether it was a blog or a youtube video. To answer your question, the most effective method of marketing for us has been word of mouth. People who have used our tea, recommended to their friends and family and we have been seeing increase in visitors and sales.

Hi,

Just wondering as of now what are your future plans for your business?

E.g. Hope to expand production/company size to cater for future demand? Or to look towards expand into more diverse tea products?

Hello,

We are looking towards expanding production and company size. We would be increase the selections but we would not be expanding to offer diverse tea products, because we focus on relaxation teas.

How did you initially fund your start-up?

Initially, both our Co-Founder and I agreed upon a specific amount to fund our start up.  It was $5K each at first, but when we realized that we were overpaying for everything and we weren’t making any sales, we each started to go deeper into our own respective savings account.  Prior to starting our business, we were working full-time in the banking industry.