Inside the Te Puna tea shop blending ritual, flavour and family.
Words Rachel Hart, images Brydie Thompson
I consider myself a jittery person. Jumpy. A bundle of nerves. My two young children (love them as I do!) don’t help matters, and neither does my morning coffee. But this week, I discovered two things that can calm my nerves. The first was a chat with the down-to-earth couple behind Webster’s Tea. The second? A cup of their famous Earl Grey.
As I sit down with Mark and Ash inside their storefront on Clarke Road, Mark explains that he has loved tea since he was a kid. His mum had five or six cups a day, but never drank it on the go. Instead, she’d put on the kettle, make a cuppa, then sit down and enjoy it. As Mark got older, she started making him one too.
Fast forward 20-odd years and Mark found himself working in a tea shop in the Canadian Rocky Mountains. He stayed there just long enough to reignite his love of tea.
When he returned home, he noticed that tea was largely an afterthought in Kiwi cafes. He thought of his mum, drinking five cups of what he had since learnt was essentially “tea bag dust”. Sure, she had the ritual down pat, but the drink itself wasn’t reaching its potential. Armed with what he had learnt in the Rockies, he set out to improve the quality of tea in New Zealand.
Like many a start-up, Mark launched Webster’s Tea from his parents’ garage. He sourced quality ingredients, and made sure leaves were vacuum sealed throughout the entire journey to retain their flavour and aroma. He blended, boiled and tinkered until he had created a lineup of stellar teas.
“We hang our hat on flavour,” Mark says, “and the secret to flavour comes down to quality.”
Webster’s Tea is fresh, organic, premium loose-leaf tea. Not only is loose-leaf higher quality than tea bags, but it also lends itself to ritual. Making a cuppa doesn’t take long, yet it feels mindful. It gives you permission to slow down.
Mark booked himself a stall at the Little Big Markets, which is where he met Ash. A graphic designer by trade, she was working for the Markets, and she was all business. “You need to peg down your gazebo” were the first words she ever spoke to him.
“I didn’t peg it down, hoping she’d come around again,” Mark says, remembering.
Fittingly, their first date was over a cup of tea, and it didn’t take long for the pair to discover a shared love of vinyl. (Seven years and two kids later, they still love their record collection, but insist their children, Harrison and Penny, aren’t named after The Beatles.)
A pandemic and a pivot
For the first four years, Webster’s Tea was a one-man band and wholesalers were the mainstay of the business. Mark had put in the hard yards of cold calling local cafes, getting them to stock quality tea to sit alongside quality coffee beans. He had an online store, but it was secondary. Then Covid-19 hit, and the nation was plunged into lockdown. Wholesale went to zero overnight.
The business was flipped on its head and the online store became the focus. Once a small percentage of sales, direct-to-consumer shipments started to soar. When things opened back up, they had Harrison, who was born only two weeks before lockdown. Weekends were precious family time now, so markets were a thing of the past.
A lot happened in a short period of time, but one thing became clear: Webster’s Tea had outgrown the garage. Mark opened a small shop in Te Puna’s Clarke Road Village. Baby Penny joined the clan. Ash officially came on board as wholesale account manager, graphic designer and social media whizz. And earlier this year, they moved a few shops down, into a bigger space.
“Tea is such a sensory product,” Mark says. “Having an in-person storefront has become an important part of the business.”
The shop is calming and uncluttered, with beautifully arranged shelves and an abundance of open space. Earthy terracotta walls lend a warm, welcoming feel. You can touch, see and smell the teas to the left, or veer right and browse the hand-picked homeware and pantry products. Want to try before you buy? There’s always something steeping at the sample station. Sometimes it’s turmeric tea, Ash’s favourite evening wind down, or the ever-popular English Breakfast. It might be a seasonal special, or their star product: Earl Grey.
“People write poetic love notes about our Earl Grey,” Ash says, and I get it: it’s a stunning tea. Many reviews include words like best, amazing and favourite. Others choose more creative terms of endearment like, “the GOAT of Earl Greys,” or my personal favourite: “… it’s on par with delicious moments such as a baby sleeping on your shoulder.”
If the goal was to be New Zealand’s premium tea of choice, I’d say Webster’s Tea has achieved it, so what’s next for this beloved tea brand?
“We’ve spent a decade honing our craft, refining the packaging, we have our beautiful shop. Now, the task is scaling,” Mark says. Ash puts it slightly differently: “World domination!” And with cafes stocking their tea in Japan and Thailand, international shipping, and a special mention in British Vogue, it seems they’re well on their way!
websterstea.co.nz
7 Clarke Road, Te Puna, Tauranga