SME Spotlight: Tea Ideas takes its brew online
You probably never thought something so bold and innovative could come in a cup.
Ever heard the famous story about the carrot, the egg and the coffee bean? In the case of Tea Ideas, the coffee in question would be tea, but make no mistake, this social enterprise based in Singapore has been turning its challenges into opportunities since 2012.
The Story of Tea Ideas
When Founder Jacinta Ong stepped off the corporate ladder and into the turbid waters of F&B, she did so with zero experience and armed only with an open mind. This turned out to be a powerful combination that allowed Tea Ideas to continue to thrive for over nine years. With a dedication to quality, health benefits and innovation, Tea Ideas has enjoyed many milestones: from serving tea to many VIPs, ministers, CEOs and the Singapore National Olympic team, to smaller victories like witnessing its elderly beneficiaries grow in character and experience.
Jacinta gave us a crash course on the health benefits of tea for physical illnesses as well as mental illnesses like Alzheimer's and ADHD; the importance of removing impurities from tea (did you know hair and insects sometimes get trapped in curled tea leaves? Yuck!); and how Gyokuro green tea, one of the most expensive green teas on the market, is grown. However, her passion for tea doesn’t stop there. Tea Ideas has experimented with mooncakes, popsicles, cookies —all with an emphasis on health benefits.
And it’s a small wonder. Step into Tea Ideas’ office and you’ll immediately notice a prominence of silver-aged staff. According to Jacinta, when they first started out, Tea Ideas found it difficult to hire young people. Because the work wasn’t too labour-intensive, they figured it wouldn’t be such a bad idea to try hiring the elderly. It paid off. The elderly beneficiaries had a work ethic that was unparalleled. Coming in early, innovating new ideas and wowing customers with their detailed knowledge of teas. In return, Tea Ideas made accommodations for their staff including simplified tasks, improved accessibility and even flexible work arrangements (hello, long weekend!). As a result, staff were more motivated to take on more responsibilities, to learn and even led to them starting their own businesses.
“We can try any new ideas with tea. One Tea, Many Possibilities!”
Tea Ideas stands for Creativity and Innovation, focusing on improving small areas of life instead of creating bold statements. So while you might not see outlandish flavours on the stand like nasi lemak tea, you can be assured of the health benefits of every cup. Take the Tea Wand, one of Tea Ideas flagship products. If you’ve ever had to stick your fingers into a cup because the string on your tea bag broke, you’ll appreciate how this nifty little product doubles as a strainer and a stirrer, allowing the tea leaves to uncurl just like it might in a regular teapot to release the full aroma. They’re even using solar panels on their green tea farm in Japan to harvest solar energy while cultivating their premium Gyokuro green tea.
It’s this mindset that allowed them to make the eventual shift online during the pandemic
Surviving COVID through digitisation
Before the pandemic, Tea Ideas jam-packed its schedule with roadshows, corporate events and trade fairs. According to Jacinta, it was like moving house every two weeks. Tea Ideas thrives on improving micro-processes like being accomodating of its elderly staff’s physical limitations, innovative packaging or refreshing its displays.
But when Singapore went into lockdown, Tea Ideas could not innovate its way out of the pandemic. Prior to its first brick and mortar store in Tan Tock Seng Hospital, Tea Ideas only stocked tea in one other store, Nishino Pharmacy in Shaw Centre. On the whole, it avoids stockists, preferring to distribute products themselves to avoid marked-up prices and to keep their premium goods as affordable as possible. But this lack of online accessibility quickly made itself known when stores shut, events cancelled, and everyone migrated online. Tea Ideas realised it had to join the crowd.
The move online was met with resistance. Navigating the online marketplace was terrifying to the elderly beneficiaries at Tea Ideas, even co-founder Jacinta felt some trepidation posting online. They had had zero guidance and they definitely didn’t grow up in the digital world. Luckily, Tea Ideas has a fantastic company culture of experimenting, innovating and most importantly, supporting its staff. The team can now use a range of digital programmes from safe entry and tracking to cashless payment methods like Favepay, video conferencing on Zoom and even livestreaming on Facebook. As Jacinta says, “Empirical experience is very important because once you try, you won’t be so fearful and after you’ve tried it a couple of times you won’t be scared anymore.”
Thanks to support from CareerContact and the student interns at Tea Ideas, the move to online stores and online marketing has been manageable. The interns gained confidence from producing authentic work, experiencing real business challenges All their interns have been happy to contribute meaningfully to a growing social enterprise. Thanks to this successful collaboration with interns, Jacinta hopes to digitally transform the business by over 80% by 2022.
Plans for the future
With heightened alerts and Singapore swinging in and out of lockdowns, plans to reopen Tea Ideas’ booth at TTSH might be pushed back to ensure the safety of their beneficiaries. But with sales increasing on platforms like Lazada, Shopee, and tea-ideas.com, there’s nowhere to go but up.
Remember that carrot, egg, coffee story we brought up at the beginning? No spoilers, but Tea Ideas has come up with yet another innovation under the brand Wickeg. Keep your eyes peeled in 2022!
Stay the course
Thinking about starting your own social enterprise? Jacinta’s advice is to stay the course. Drawing from her experience, “The journey is not easy, you need a lot of support and the right community, however, you can start small and scale up.”
CareerContact connects students with business owners in Southeast Asia to try these challenges on a small-scale and to learn the processes. For the best learning experience, sign up to the careercontact.app.
“Keep innovating.”
“Don’t limit yourself. Innovation doesn’t need to be very expensive, you just need to have an idea, go with the right people and move one step at a time. My husband always says “You save a little starfish one at a time, and it makes a difference to that starfish.” That’s what keeps us going, to make difference to someone, one at a time.” — Jacinta Ong, Founder of Tea Ideas
Tea Ideas, National Centre for Infectious Diseases (NCID), Tan Tock Seng Hospital, 16 Jln Tan Tock Seng, Singapore 308442; tea-ideas.com
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