Starbucks tea shop to open...

If you would have told me this 10 years ago, when we tea shop, tea bar, progressive tea stores were before our time, I would have gasped...


Starbucks tea shop to open in U-Village
The new Tazo tea store will sell hot and iced tea drinks and tea lattes, and it will feature a blending station where customers can create their own versions of Tazo's existing teas.

By Melissa Allison
Seattle Times business reporter



Three months after debuting its first noncoffee store — a fresh-juice shop in Bellevue Square — Starbucks plans to open a store centered on tea in University Village. It is expected to open in the fall, replacing Lululemon, which is moving to a larger space in the shopping center.

Starbucks officials see the juice and tea stores as destinations where customers can experience its Evolution Fresh and Tazo brands in 3-D, but they decline to say how many other juice and tea stores they may open.

Both brands also are sold as packaged goods in Starbucks stores — including two at University Village — and in grocery stores.

"We want to raise customer expectations for tea the same way Starbucks did for coffee," said Charlie Cain, a vice president with Tazo.

Blending station

The new Tazo tea store will sell hot and iced tea drinks and tea lattes, and it will feature a blending station where customers can create their own versions of Tazo's existing teas

For example, a customer could replace the black-tea base in Tazo's chai with a white tea or rooibos base — or develop something unique.

Customer-blended teas will be sold by the ounce. Prices have not been set.

Although Tazo already books $1.4 billion in annual sales, Starbucks sees more potential, said Chris Bruzzo, Starbucks' senior vice president of channel-brand management.

"What we learned in our years building the third-place experience [with Starbucks] is that having a direct, personalized connection to consumers is powerful and creates a halo that benefits the brand when the consumer sees it on the [grocery] aisle," he said.

Bruzzo, who previously launched Starbucks' successful digital and social-media strategy, now focuses on the marketing of various Starbucks products, including what the company considers its three emerging brands: Tazo, Evolution Fresh, and Seattle's Best Coffee.

Seattle's Best is a chain of about 80 shops that also sells coffee in 50,000 outlets, including Subway and Burger King stores.

Tazo purchase

Starbucks bought Tazo, a Portland tea company, in 1999 for $8.1 million.

Steve Smith, who co-founded Tazo and Stash Tea, became known at Tazo for creating blends called Awake and Calm, which cost about twice as much a other teas.

Tazo's operations are now being moved to Starbucks' roasting and packaging plant in Kent.

The tea store is a good for University Village's mix, said Susie Plummer, general manager of the shopping center.

"I've been looking for a great tea store for about 10 years," she said. "Even on personal vacations to Vancouver [B.C.], there are some great owner-operated mom-and-pops up there, so to me this is perfect."

Melissa Allison: 206-464-3312 or mallison@seattletimes.com. On Twitter @AllisonSeattle.

From where I sit...

My tea journey started in 1996 in the Ritz Carlton. Harney and Sons Loose Leaf teas where flowing to any $40 a head High Tea ticket purchaser. My absolute favorite was Jasmine Oolong piping hot, with a spike of milk and one brown sugar cube - of course tasting best out of a Ritz Carlton fine bone China cup. The jasmine was light and pure, not heavy and weighted on the tongue. Many of the high tea guests at the Ritz Carlton had no idea about the tea they were drinking and often wanted to purchase everything about the experience to replicate at home; the Ritz had many retail missed opportunities. My fellow tea service gals and I had discussed opening our own tea rooms;  fast forward to 2002 and I actually made it happen. I had spent the interim years in Franchise ownership of quick service deserts and drinks. So what if I could put the two together? And blend my own tea blends with exciting embellishments of fruit pieces, chile threads, or even candy? That is what I did in creating the Lavender Lounge Tea Company. Not a tea room, but a Tea Lounge ~ a tea salon and tea bar type concept. Urban, eclectic, and uniquely like no other. I loved chatting to the guests and taking polls on the next desired flavor concoction or what they enjoyed as their family tea tradition. So many folks grew up with such uniquely special tea traditions. I loved helping to create Southern California's new tea traditions and succeeded in creating the teenage and mother and father alike "hot spot" for sipping hot tea and slurping iced tea, and selling all they needed to take the intimidation out of any loose tea experience, so they could continue the experiences at home. After 7 years, I learned what I needed to in tea, QS tea, and retail and slowly grew exhausted of managing he day to day of owning and operating my own stores, brand, blends, employees, and wholesale accounts. I tried to divide the company when I sold in 2008, but ended up by negotiating entirely all - the sale of the brand, stores, and wholesale accounts as well.  Now I work for one of the largest tea importers in the United States. From where I sit, it is ever so interesting to see all the applications of tea. From RTD, Chai's, blends, to Skin and Dog Food companies using teas and herbs. But what is most exciting is to see - what I created in my small brand that could have gone chain wide - being picked up conceptually by other chains and they are growing more every day. My concepts in my tea shops are what I see in almost every successful brand and growing store tea chain out there. When I started, the only way to find tea was tea at a "tea room" venue, and that was not really for retail, just a meal. Now there are tea retailers like my concept and they are even using more candy shop like feel in tea, more and more. Speaking of fun blends and trends, I can tell you of at least 6 tea blends of mine that were my crazy and unorthodox brainstorms that I see "borrowed" permanently, and I am flattered. (Now I know why these random marketing companies would order one pound here and five pounds there). But how do these

tea chains measure success, I wonder? Tea is an ever so laborious product, if you consider it start to finish, but that is for another blog title! It is certainly exciting to see where Starbucks will go now in the newest tea concept store, and certainly exciting to see this race finally get started. I can't wait to see who will compete on the West Coast in tea retail and tea bar concept action. I am ready to visit and critique. I am ready to see how it measures up to what I dream up of now - adding up what I did then, from where I sit now, to what the gap is on the street today. From where I sit, I am am ready to run. Tea concept stores are about to hit that tipping point, and I am ready.