World Tea Conference & Expo 2022

Reminder! Bring your registration confirmation and I.D. when picking up your badge.

Meet and Greet Open to Everyone in the Conference Area.  Just a quick visit with everyone to have a cup of tea and say Hello.  

Reminder! Bring your registration confirmation and I.D. when picking up your badge.

Tea Business Incubator is for anyone who is thinking about starting a tea business or just starting a tea business and looking for knowledge about the business-end of tea.  Strong knowledge of the tea leaf is most helpful during the session. Tea Business Incubator is not the place to learn about tea appreciation or the leaf itself but the Business of tea.  Kevin Gascoyne will be your Lead Emcee and a Speaker for the day,.
We strongly encourage completion of World Tea Academy 1 & 2 before taking this course or having a general knowledge of tea through reading The Tea Companion by Jane Pettigrew or Modern Tea by Lisa Bolt Richardson or Tea Lover’s Treasury by James Norwood Pratt.
7:30 am – 8:00 am Check-in/Light snack muffins, juice & tea/Short introduction for the day by Emcee: Kevin Gascoyne
8:00 am – 9:30 am: The Big Picture a ‘reality check’ - by Kevin Gascoyne
Will the tea Journey work for you? What do you want to say? How do you start on your journey?
The realities of buying from distributors vs. source.
What you want to sell vs what you need to sell.
Time ratio between buying and selling
Is a webstore cheaper than bricks and mortar?
Limiting your focus in a realm of possibilities
9:45 am – 10:45 am: 50 Ways to Attract and Keep Loyal Customers – by Babette Donaldson
Even if your tea business is still in the dream stage, you should be able to visualize your first customers and how to find them? Have you set up your email marketing tools or blog? Have you collected data from other tea loyalty programs and considered how to craft your own? Join Babette Donaldson for a fast-paced hour to earmark 50+ checkpoints to help you get and keep loyal customers.

• Plan your customer strategies before you spend a dime.

• Craft your personal story. What kind of "tea person" do you want to be?
• Prepare to put yourself "out there" in front of future customers.
• Strategize options for multiple sales venues.
• Sell your first package of tea and plan how you will keep that first customer.

11:00 am – Noon:  Stocking Up: The Must-Haves to Start Your Business – Sharyn Johnston (There is nothing worse than buyer’s remorse especially when first starting off a new business. Let Sharyn arm you with the basics to give you the edge so that you can spring into action and fill those customer orders).
Noon – 1:00 pm: Lunch Break
1:00 pm – 2:00 pm: Nitty-gritty operations stuff that can make or break your business: Packing, shipping, and unboxing! - Nishchal Banskota
In today’s world esp. during and after the pandemic, it is extremely important to streamline your operations, supply chain, and customer experience. While you can most certainly blame the international shipping rates and supply chain issues for increased pricing, your customers always expect an affordable tea with a “wow” customer experience. We will discuss how you can achieve most of this, if not all, through various tips and tricks in packaging, shipping, and unboxing. Here are some more details on the specific topics:
Understand the current supply chain and shipping issues (both international and domestic).
Learn the basics of shipping domestically in the US and what services are best for the tea business. You’ll also take away some tips and tricks on how to save money by choosing certain types of packaging and services.
Understand what exists out there for tea companies in terms of building a business, co-packing, fulfillment services, and so on (All lifesavers if you have the funding for it).
Unboxing experience and how to “wow” your customers and why is it super important in today’s world to do so!
General tips and tricks of successfully running an eCommerce business.
2:15 pm – 3:15 pm: Breaking Even Instead of Breaking Bad ---  Don Ho
What you don’t know can hurt you and if you don’t know how to price your teas properly you will be hurt financially, and no one wants that.
3:30 pm – 4:30 pm: Why a Business Plan? –-- Shabnam Weber
“If you fail to plan, you are planning to fail!” Benjamin Franklin. Benjamin knew what he was talking about you should listen carefully to this session. So, plan on attending this one and pulling together a business plan to follow to the success of your new venture.
4:30 pm – 5:00 pm: Group Question & Answer Session --- Speakers from the day
Now is when you probably have lots of questions for the speakers from today. This 30 minutes will go fast so be ready.

Hard to believe it will be 20 years since the very first Take Me 2 Tea.  It is time to celebrate and remember all the good times and all the fallen tea luminaries that helped everyone on the tea path. 

Join Sara Stewart Martinelli for an informative and interactive class that explores 12 commonly used tea herbs, their medicinal uses, and their flavor profiles. After a presentation that explores the botany, history, folklore, and use of each herb, participants will have the opportunity to cup each herbal infusion independently and record their own sensory evaluation. Finally, participants will embark on the creative process of blending herbs and teas to create their own personal blend. This workshop will explore, enlighten, and inspire people to dive into the world of nature’s botanica gifts, and opens the realm of tea, beverages, and cocktails wide open to a world of endless flavors and uses.

Forth coming

Disruptions in consumer behavior dictate a revolution as retail transactions move online and a hybrid experiential realm transforms physical locations
- Upheavals in tea sourcing and supply have permanently reconfigured the supply chain
- Oversupply will abruptly transition to a scarcity of quality teas due to a changing climate despite mechanization and farm-level efforts to mitigate the impact of higher temperatures and less precipitation.

How to infuse personality into your brand to help drive generate sales.   “The Secret to Succeeding in Business is In the first to letters of Business… Bu!”     A mantra that Tea Master and personal Brand expert Daniel Lewis has used over the last 9 years to build a multi-award-winning and multi-million dollar tea business.     What happens when you remove “the Steve Jobs” from “the Apple’s” of the world… You end up bringing them back.   Removing personality from your business can often result in the downfall of any company.   So, how does one incorporate personality into their business?     Step 1… Join the session    Step 2... leave the rest up to Daniel!  

During this workshop, we will cover the major categories of China’s teas with tasting organized as flights. Comments during the tasting will focus on processing and developing a useful lexicon. The reasoning behind the grouping of each flight and the lessons to be gained will be explored.  Wholesale pricing information will allow attendees to assess value and establish benchmark teas.

Tea Flights is something new just added this year to replace Origins.  These will be quick 30 minute tastings of the most popular teas or botanicals that come from different growing regions.  This will give you the opportunity to taste and learn about what each region produces and the flavor profiles to look for. This year we will be a cocktail to some of the offerings plus a special drawing from one of the countries for a trip for 2 (airfare not included) for a tea tour, more on that later. 
Starting at 8:00 am and ending at Noon the schedule will go as follows:
China - An Hui Province - Shunan Teng
Herbals & Botanicals - Sharyn Johnston
Japan - Rona Tison
Africa - Wouter Verelst
Nepal - Jeni Dodd

Reminder! Bring your registration confirmation and I.D. when picking up your badge.

Combining two passions into one. We will discuss how we decided to collaborate with our two businesses to make a successful partnership.  From planning to execution, we will highlight ways to work with other industries to further the appeal of tea in other markets. This is a love story with a happy ending.

Cold Brew Tea Mixology    This seminar explores mixology fundamentals using cold brew tea, which will help you to create classic and modern-styled tea cocktails and mocktails. Attendees will gain valuable recipe ideas and important insights into mixology as we delve into flavor profiling for creative offerings. We will touch on the cold brewing basics of tea selection, exchanging temperature for extended brew time, and serving cold brew tea as a still beverage, on nitro, or even as a hot beverage.
Attendees will understand basic cold brewing methods for tea. Attendees will understand varied serving methods for cold brew teas. Attendees will leave with recipe ideas to explore tea mixology in business or at home.

As business owners and potential business owners, one might dread the process of importing and exporting teas. Well, with the global economy, it is not as difficult as you might think. The session will provide an easy overview of the importing and exporting process and logistics and the do’s and don’ts to prepare your business for success.
1) Learn what are the most important things to know when importing and exporting.

2) Take home an easy step-by-step guide to importing and exporting.

3) Learn how effective logistics and shipping can help your business become more profitable.

MARKETING REFRESH   For business professionals seeking innovation as a means to refresh what was once counted on as normal for marketing and promotions of anything that relates to tea.  Just as a product or service can be innovative, so can your marketing approach. Reach new heights, show every age how tea can benefit them, shift from old norms, accept and embrace a new path forward for refreshed and continued success. Let's steep something new!
1. Discuss traditional marketing plus beneficial and timely shifts.
2. Weigh innovations and trends and how they might impact your outreach.
3. Interact and exchange a few ideas with others too!

Forth Coming

COVID-19 significantly changed the type of benefits consumers were seeking from functional beverages. Now, on the path toward recovery, a new shift is underway as consumers grapple with uncertainties of the “new normal.” Mindfulness as a functional benefit in tea is at the forefront of product innovation; though, energy, immunity, sleep, and beauty, among other concerns, remain opportune areas for tea stakeholders to explore. In this session, Euromonitor International will examine the post-pandemic functional landscape and implications for tea.
 

• What if you could catch your customers’ attention with your product label, they aimed their phone camera at your product, and they clicked to a video that describes your tea experience? This is one of several of the newest trends expected for 2022. Engaging your customers is more important now than ever before. Join Rob Freeman as he presents Don’t Just Label It, Catch Their Attention!  Learn about the latest trends in beverage label printing, new “eye-catching” materials, and some of the newest marketing concepts today. This 1-hour presentation is recommended for those looking to create new pressure-sensitive product labels for their tea products.
• Objectives / 3 Take-Aways:
  • New trends: Capturing the customer’s attention with your label at the point-of-sale
  • Understanding Label Sustainability vs Durability
  • Avoiding the most common mistakes in designing product labels

From Napa to Nilgiri: how fine wine and quality tea have more in common than you think. What can tea learn from wine’s experiences of premiumisation?
The presentation will look at similarities between the two industries, specifically with a view to understanding how the quality sector in tea and wine is differentiated from the everyday sector in terms of cultivation and manufacture (50%). It will then look at areas tea can learn from wine in terms of premiumisation and practical examples. (50%)--
An appreciation and understanding of the similarities between the quality sectors of both industries and where quality comes from compared to the mainstream.
Visual evidence via pictures and brief video clips (5-10 seconds) of the costs and why tea needs to premiumize
information to help the audience speak with more freedom on speciality tea and a look at some practical examples.

Pairing Tea and Bourbon: Participants will learn how to taste and evaluate bourbon before they move into pairing three bourbons with three teas as they look for common notes and influencers. Tea Maestro Bruce Richardson is a graduate of the Woodford Reserve Bourbon Academy where he has made four appearances at Tea and Bourbon dinners hosted by the world-famous distillery.

Learn the marketing secrets that will engage more customers, and help you sell more tea by telling a story in a different way.
You might think tea is what sells? Actually, tea is just a small part of the story. The bigger “picture” is “how” tea makes your customer feel.
Do they drink tea in a quiet reflective moment? Is tea a shared experience that draws their loved ones closer? Is tea the “ice breaker” of a new friendship?
It’s about creating stories through video and images that sell tea. Pictures connect the customer with emotions they can identify with and through this visual stimulus they remember those moments that warmed their hearts: moments they would like to recreate, with tea.
Remember the old adage, a picture is worth a thousand words? It’s true, and video is even MORE valuable than that!
3 Take-Aways

1. Tea is ONLY a part of what you sell.
2. It’s about the story you share in pictures
3. Video makes a difference!

Explore the interactive Expo Hall Floor, find new products, sample new flavors hitting the market, learn, and grow your business!

This is a ticketed item.
Movie Night: 
A feature film, 9 DRAGONS TEA documents the epic journey of tea from her ancient origins in China to Europe and to American, changing world history for over 400 years. There will be popcorn and candy to snack on during this beautiful film. See Trailer at: https://9dragonstea.com/about/

Ticketed event with a 40 person limit.  

In this immersive and intimate tasting event, professional tea taster Kevin Gascoyne shares a carefully selected sequence of teas from around the world.  A tasting experience to impress your pallet like never before.  The event will feature some of the rarest and most exclusive batches of teas that money can buy – a one-time opportunity not to be missed!

Bridging sensory language and understanding from across beverage industries to root quality discussions in common language and help you define what you taste.
1. Qualitative Understanding of the Organoleptic Experience
2. The effect of Water on Beverages
3. The landscape of Beverage Evaluation Language
4. Discovering what these terms mean for your tastes

How to build a high-profit online tea business in the new economy  Whether you are a seasoned professional already in business or starting up a new business, one thing we know for sure is that a pandemic can change everything.   As we emerge from the effects of Covid-19 we are faced with new challenges when it comes to opening or maintaining an online tea business.  More than ever consumers realize the importance of maintaining a healthy lifestyle for themselves and their families, they just need help when it comes to the products that may best meet their needs.   Functional teas are leading the industry from the standpoint of profitability and longevity in building your brand.  Understanding what functional teas are and the best teas and herbs to meet your customer's needs starts by first understanding who your customers are.  I will help identify key characteristics of identifying customers so that you can create the best products to meet their needs for an ongoing revenue stream and not just one-off sales.
1. Understanding the supply chain will help you determine the products you can more easily source while focusing on domestic grown products for a more stable inventory to grow your business. 2. Understand why functional teas are the best solution for high margins and long-term repeat customers. 3. Learn proven strategies to secure high-volume pricing with low-volume orders as you build your brand.

Mate beyond the traditions: New perspectives for the South America leaf. Mate (ilex) is a leave, not a herb;    -Brazilian Mate (ilex) is the most environmental protector tea in the world.

The role of business in socially just and environmentally sustainable tea. Globally, more than 13 million people are involved in tea supply chains, and for the majority, their livelihoods are almost entirely dependent upon the production of tea. Social inequalities, economic instability, and the threat of climate change are some of the biggest challenges facing these tea communities. Too big for one organization to handle alone, without fundamental change these issues are only likely to deepen over time.
The tea industry is coming under increasing scrutiny from civil society and the media, whilst legislation and regulation are incorporating social and environmental performance. What does this mean for tea companies and the tea sector?
The most urgent social and environmental challenges in tea-producing regions; • Who cares? The rise of the regulator; the NGO campaigns; • The business case for ethical, sustainable tea companies; and • The collaborative advantage.

Why every business should be thinking about short-form video, which platforms are best for sharing short-form video, and tips for getting started

Reminder! Bring your registration confirmation and I.D. when picking up your badge.

Survivors' review and set for New Directions of Taiwan Tea Industry.
Less, Slower, Easier, Simpler, Fewer.
1.) Review your tea business 2.) Rethink your new direction 3.) Sustainability in life and in tea.

Tea Trends of the Future will explore how consumer needs are changing based on lifestyle shifts and how this will impact key tea trends from flavors to packaging to marketing.

This session will explore how consumer needs are changing based on lifestyle shifts and how this will impact key tea trends from flavors to packaging to marketing.

In this must-attend session – TeaBloggers Roundtable 2022 – panelists will discuss: the state of tea writing and blogging today, how have things changed, what remains relevant, what is captivating readers now, alternative methods of communication (podcasts, InstaStories, YouTube) linking it to your writing, and suggestions for the foreseeable future. Participating tea bloggers will also cover how to work with bloggers – including how to pitch and do’s and don’ts – for those who are looking to generate attention for their tea business. This session will be moderated by JoAni Johnson of Scandalous Tea, who’s also the chief coordinating organizer of TeaBloggers Roundtable, and it’ll feature influential tea industry bloggers such as Nicole Wilson of Tea For Me Please, Rachel Carter of iHeart Teas, Cody Wade of The Oolong Drunk, and Babette Donalson of T Ching. The TeaBloggers Roundtable has taken place at the World Tea Conference + Expo for numerous years both formally and informally. In fact, TeaBloggers Roundtable was even nominated for a World Tea Award in 2017. Join the industry’s bloggers for this informative session and bring plenty of questions for a lively discussion.

The never been told insider story of Teavana.  What happened, what didn’t happen, and where is the brand positioned today? This is a story of a dream career that started as a General Manager at one Teavana store in NJ, all the way to transitioning the brand into Starbucks, after the acquisition. The heart and soul of the brand can still be experienced, not necessarily in the US, but in Asia, through a few Teavana flagship stores in Shanghai and Tokyo.  New and tea companies can learn how to run a successful and enduring tea business, which ultimately depends on your vision, mission & values.  There is no secret sauce, but I can share a narrative so tea businesses large and small can arrive and ideate with their own takeaways.
1. Knowledge is power.
2. Innovation is Key To Success. Don’t follow the status quo.
3. Let Passion and Perseverance finish its work.

forth coming

Want to establish a relationship with your customers and build a personal connection?  Why not try leading a trip to India with them? Tea tourism, much like a distillery or vineyard tour, will allow you to become the trusted source of information that engenders loyalty to your brand. In-depth product knowledge is a must because today’s consumer demands and deserves accurate information about the substances they’re putting in their bodies. Sharing with them the value of tea, especially when ‘specialty teas’ are growing in popularity, will require education to justification for higher prices.

Forth Coming

The African tea industry has undergone a lot of changes through the pandemic, creating room for diversification and opening doors to more opportunities.
The industry has so much more to offer stakeholders along the value chain.

The 2018 Farm Bill legalized hemp, differentiating "industrial hemp" and "marijuana" solely by a plant's Delta-9 THC content. Then...radio silence. With little to no guidance from the FDA and DEA for any substance that is not Delta-9 THC, states have been left to their own devices--and oh the devices they have invented! While trade groups argue about whether other forms of THC are legal (Delta-8? Delta-10?) state legislatures and other state-based agencies have been busy trying to protect consumers, with only the occasional peep from the FDA. Did you know that whether your CBD-containing product is legal depends entirely on which state it will be sold in? It's true--and some of those states have particular labeling requirements. Can you name the states that have banned CBD in food and drink? Do you know which states have banned other hemp extract products? Given the chaos, what can you say on your webpage, and what can your ambassadors say on social media?
(1) State laws regarding hemp-derived ingredients in food and beverage products sold to consumers vary wildly. Manufacturers need to identify their geographic market(s) early in the product lifecycle in order to ensure compliance with state laws regarding labeling and marketing. (2) No company should make a claim that their hemp-derived food and beverage products are "100% legal." (3) Responsibility for claims made by social media "influencers" is more likely to land on the product manufacturer, not on the influencer. This includes obvious gaffes such as the influencer making a claim that isn't legal under DSHEA, but also includes more subtle items such as hitting the "like" button on posts made by consumers that include a health claim.

This is your chance to pitch an idea for WTN or to be a speaker at the next World Tea Expo in 2023.

Aaron Kiel, Editor for WTN and FaithAnn Bailes, Content & Conference Mgr. for WTE will be available for you to sit down and talk to them one on one and get immediate feedback on your ideas.

Everyone is invited to pitch!  See you soon.

Explore the interactive Expo Hall Floor, find new products, sample new flavors hitting the market, learn, and grow your business!