SEATTLE – By all accounts, Ghim Sim Chua already was living the American dream before he started his Seattle-based Cha Dao Tea Co. a year ago.
After coming to the United States in 1991, the Singapore native graduated from Stanford University with a computer science degree and landed a position at Microsoft Corp. Yet after 81/2 years as a software engineer, the good job and plenty of money just weren’t enough.
In May of last year, Chua decided to quit his job and began dabbling as an investor in a Duck Tour operation in San Francisco. Still unfulfilled, Chua embraced one of his childhood loves: tea.
With $300,000 of his own money, Chua began Cha Dao, where he is chief executive, master brewer, salesman and driving force behind the year-old firm, which already has four ready-to-drink teas in 157 stores.
Cha Dao, which means “the way of tea,” has four flavors: jasmine green, herbal chrysanthemum, high mountain oolong and Japanese green sencha. At least four more are in development.
The company’s clientele includes a few Seattle-area Thriftways, 73 Quality Food Centers in Washington, and bakeries up and down the West Coast.
Joe Simrany, president of the New York-based Tea Association of the U.S.A., said AriZona and Lipton dominate the ready-to-drink tea market, which has grown from about $200 million in annual sales about 15 years ago to about $2.4 billion in yearly sales.
Simrany said small companies such as Cha Dao are popping up all over the place and finding a niche. “Many of the companies will remain small unless they pick up the attention of a big player or if they are unique,” Simrany said.
Chua, who wants the company to grow so that he can focus on marketing and development, said he’s been pleasantly surprised by his early success.
“I have been extremely lucky in many, many ways to see something I created that has others buying into it. I have a great team,” Chua said.
That team, so far, is extremely small.
With just five contract employees and a handful of part-timers, Chua brews the teas inside a 40-gallon kettle at the Turner &Pease Co. warehouse in Interbay, where he leases space. The tea is bought from Taiwan, Japan and China.
After the tea is brewed, it is transferred to another kettle, where it cools slightly. It is then poured into plastic bottles, which employees cap and label by hand. The goods quickly are placed in cold storage and then are shipped in cases to stores. Chua said the teas always stay cold, and he recommends just a 45-day shelf life to guarantee a high quality.
“What distinguishes us is we have a fresh product,” Chua said. “I want to make sure the tea is something I would select and would appeal to me.”
Chua is such a perfectionist that he provided a credit to some stores that were sent teas bottled at a plant in Oregon earlier this year that didn’t measure up to his standards. The tea is no longer bottled there, and Chua, who tastes every batch, has brought the process back in-house.
Talk to us
> Give us your news tips.
> Send us a letter to the editor.
> More Herald contact information.
