Your Before Tea Time Checklist
You’re going to be a great host. Let’s make sure you feel like it.
Whether it’s your first tea time or your 25th, it can feel daunting to think about going to a cafe and waiting for 1–5 random people to show up. You don’t know who they are. They could just flake entirely! (It’s very easy to just not do things). What will you talk about?
Do these sound obvious? Great.
They’re easy to remember, and they’re all important.
✅ #1: Telling people about the tea time helps ensure strangers are at your tea time.
1–2 weeks before your tea time is a great opportunity to remind your friends, communities, and/or the internet-at-large that TWS exists, that you exist, that you’re a Host of TWS, that you have a tea time coming up, why you do this in the first place, and, of course, that they should tell their friends about your tea time.
👉🏽 Writing Facebook posts about Tea With Strangers (to get people you don’t know to come to your tea time) →
Your friends are interesting people (I promise), and interesting people know other interesting people. Give your friends nudge and a reason to rave about your tea time and invite whoever they know to join you to make a great conversation.
✅ #2: Sending your attendees a reminder gets everyone on the same page (and reduces no shows dramatically).
An email beforehand reminds people you’re a real person, sets expectations, and gives you an opportunity to confirm that everyone’s coming.
Given the nature of the gathering, it’s easy for people to get cold feet, and as we all know, it’s much easier to not do things than it is to do them. Especially things with a positively nebulous (but also, nebulously positive) value proposition.
On one hand, tea time could be a delightful, awe-inspiring experience. On the other hand, Netflix has always been a trusty steed of idle pleasure on a weekday night. When someone is contemplating going to that random thing they signed up for on the internet for free, you’re competing with 18 new comedy specials every single week.
This is why introducing yourself is critical! (And also, reminding people of time, place, and giving them an opportunity to cancel their seat so you’re not staring at the cafe door waiting for some faceless person named “Trevor” to walk into the door)
Here are some example reminder emails from two random tea times I hosted in the last year.
🧞Quick tips for writing a strong reminder email:
- Ask people to reply and confirm that they’re coming. This is huge for accountability and attendance rate.
- Let people know you’re actually looking forward to this. Excitement is generative!
- Clearly mention time and place details
- Offer your phone number if you feel comfortable doing so
- Mention what you look like so they know what to look for
- Set some conversational context with an open-ended prompt (e.g. “Write one question down that you’d want to ask someone but never get a chance to. If the conversation gets awkward, we can always draw from the pile. If you forget, I’m sure the cafes has napkins.”)
✅ #3: Thinking about what you’ve been thinking about puts you in the headspace to hold space for your attendees.
The nice thing about this one is that you don’t actually need to do much besides try to keep your phone in your pocket during a few idle moments throughout the day leading into your tea time.
Being reflective is generally good for you, but it pays dividends (well, in the conversation department). As a Host, your attendees are often looking to you to hold the space of the tea time. That means opening up and sharing what you’re thinking about, asking questions with a real sense of curiosity, and paying attention to what everybody has to say.
Listening to yourself throughout the day better positions you to actually express where you’re coming from. And when you do it, everybody at the tea time tends to follow suit. People mirror each others behavior, and this tendency is amplified massively in an environment with a small handful of strangers sitting together for 2 hours voluntarily.
👨🏽🍳 Some prompts to help you do this:
- What have you been thinking about lately? Why do you think that’s been on your mind?
- What‘s going on that is affecting your emotional state?
- How are you feeling about this tea time today? Could you share that with your attendees when you sit down and start the conversation?
- Do you think your experience might be relatable to others in the group? What sort of questions could you ask to help you find common ground with everyone in the group?
- How quickly can you get past conversations about pop culture, the weather or current events?
✅ #4: Getting to your tea time early eliminates logistical stress.
For some people, this is easy. For others, this means starting tea time 15 minutes early when you put it in your calendar.
The more at home you feel, the more at home your attendees will feel.
Find a table. Arrange seats. Get comfortable. You’re about to be sitting at this table for 2 hours facilitating a conversation with brand new people, and you have no idea what you’re about to talk about.
