A Teahouse for Austin

When I was little and personal computers were new, we would play some very simple computer games at school.  One of my favorite ones of these was a simulation of running a lemonade stand.  You had to buy the sugar, lemons, and water, and then set your price for a glass of lemonade, choose what your sign would say, and gradually you would build up the amount of materials you could buy and grow your little lemonade business. 

This is how I feel every day, as an actual business owner.  I sell off my tea and save my money and then, next time around, I can buy a little more tea than I had before, and make a little more money.  I put away the surplus profits and use them to buy a sign, or attractive packaging, or something less interesting like buy insurance.  But it all feels like this jolly little simulation, where your success – how often someone actually buys your product – depends on a combination of choices you make and an infinitely complex algorithm that we call fate. 

The basic maneuver is, at its essence, straight arbitrage.  It goes in little escalating waves, like a rollercoaster, getting higher and higher with each pass.  Eventually, hopefully, you build up enough steam to crest the tallest hill and soar down the other side for a while before it all begins again.

The next big hill for my company is a brick and mortar space where we can sell and serve tea.  That’s the beginning of Phase II – controlling the means of acquisition and distribution of the tea. Having a teahouse/teashop means that there’s a real, solid, consistent place that people can go to buy our tea.  Up until now, you could only buy it at HOPE farmer’s market on Sunday, or our East Side headquarters on Tuesdays and Fridays, or a very limited selection scattered amongst a dozen or so local Austin businesses.  Getting over that next hump means that when someone asks me “where can I get your tea?” I can send them to a physical place with normal business hours. 

Soon there will be two places like that.  Under the auspices of Wunder-Pilz kombucha, several of my friends and I have joined forces to create a secluded little upstairs boutique and art gallery space on South Congress.  In addition to West China tea it sells Chocosutra Chocolate, Wunder-Pilz Kombucha, handmade jewelry by Clementine & Co., handmade ceramics by Chris Long, and imported Oaxacan goods.  It’s by-appointment only and features a rotating art installation by different local artists, curated by Katie Rose Pipkin.  It’s small and doesn’t have all of my inventory but it does have the higher-end teas and teawares that I don’t want to bring back and forth to the Farmer’s Market every week, and more importantly, it’s open Monday through Saturday from 2-7. 

The second place is going to be an actual teahouse where people go to drink tea, like the teahouses in China.  Chengdu, my adopted Chinese hometown, is famous for the many traditional teahouses that line the lazy Funan river.  These are generally quiet courtyards and verandas, paved with flagstones and shaded by trees and pots of bamboo.  The leisure-loving people of Chengdu spend hours in the creaky wicker chairs drinking tea, playing ma jiang, reading, and enjoying the breeze and the river. 

Austin’s new teahouse is going to be based on the traditional Chengdu teahouse, and its courtyard will be the broad, brick-paved courtyard of Spider House, an Austin institution tucked away on a tree-lined side street just north of campus, right off the main drag.  Once a coffee shop, now more of a bar, Spider House hosts a fleet of symbiotic mini businesses on its sprawling campus, including several food trucks and a tattoo parlor.  We intend to open next month in a free-standing building at the back of the courtyard, where we will remain true to the core principal of a teahouse and do nothing but serve tea.  No food, no coffee, no sweeteners or milk or lemon or flavorings – just pure tea, by the cup or the pot, and, God willing, we’ll even have a dark, quiet little inside space with cushions and low tables where people can practice the exquisite art of Gong Fu Cha.

My intention is for it to be a distinct entity from West China Tea.  I’m not interested in taking on investors for West China Tea but I’d be willing to for the teahouse, which will essentially be a separate business that buys, prepares, and serves West China Tea.  I’m not sure what I’ll call it yet, but I’ve been toying with Bat City Teahouse.  Austin is Bat City after all, and bats are good luck in Chinese culture, and the West China Tea Company logo is a bat.  I’m open to suggestions on the name! 

We are supposed to open the Spider House space next month, but it all depends on my ability to get the space up to code – that means lots of sinks, apparently – and on Spider House getting their Change of Use approval for the space.  Once it’s open, Austin will have its own Chinese style teahouse, and I’ll finally have a real life lemonade stand.  The anxiety, and the anticipation, of trying to make it a reality forms a knot in my stomach as the rollercoaster climbs, trestle by gut-wrenching trestle, to the precipice of destiny. 

The Tea Gallery is located on South Congress and is open Monday through Saturday, 2-7.  Call 512-387-4770 for directions and to make an appointment.