Today we’d like to introduce you to Jennifer Purrenhage.
So, before we jump into specific questions about the business, why don’t you give us some details about you and your story.
In 2003, when I was working on my Master’s degree in Biology, I also completed by Yoga Teacher Training Certification, and in 2010, I received my Holistic Health Practitioner Certificate from the American Association of Drugless Practitioners. In 2010, I was consulting with a handful of clients who were working to create better work-life balance and found myself advocating a lot of meditation and mindfulness practice. But, the women I worked with were hard-working, dedicated, and incredibly driven (I could relate). I was confronted again and again by people’s difficulty with meditation – they reported not being able to sit still, and not being able to stop thinking. Nobody who’s experiencing that wants to hear that that’s the point of it all, so I quickly changed my ‘prescription’ from meditation practice to a daily ‘tea ritual’ as mindfulness practice.
I have always loved tea. I love everything about it. I love the way it looks, the way it smells, the way it tastes, and the way it soothes my mind and my body. I love the way it feels to hold a beautiful, warm mug of tea with both hands, and how such a simple thing can help me reset my mood or my outlook.
I remembered one day that my friend Amy and I had made our own tea blends for Christmas presents one year, and how much I’d enjoyed that. Before I knew it, I’d ordered ridiculous quantities of flowers and herbs, and I was creating my own blends. I gifted my first couple creations to my then-clients and got overwhelmingly positive feedback. Within the year, I had shifted my focus from working with clients one-on-one to tea. About a year later, after a short time under another name, I became The Tea Alchemist.
Tea isn’t my only focus, though. I have a Ph.D. in Ecology, and I teach environmental conservation and wildlife biology at the University of New Hampshire.
Over the years, I’ve grappled with how much to grow the tea business, and what that would mean for the other roles I play. I decided to keep my job as a lecturer at UNH, while also making tea for our online and local customers, and a small number of wholesale clients.
And so, I spend my days at the university, and I moonlight as The Tea Alchemist. My work at UNH allows me to exercise my scientist-educator side, and at The Tea Alchemist I am a creative and an entrepreneur.
We’re always bombarded by how great it is to pursue your passion, etc. – but we’ve spoken with enough people to know that it’s not always easy. Overall, would you say things have been easy for you?
This is hard to answer. I think, to some extent, smooth vs. challenging must do more with your perspective and your goals for your business.
Things have felt smooth because I’ve always been open to the business growing organically, at its own pace, and because people responded so well to the product. But there are always challenges.
For me, the challenges were all related to deciding how much (and how) I wanted to grow the business.
When your product has a shelf life, you really must ask yourself, early on, how big you want your business to be. Another challenge was identifying how I wanted to get my product to customers – in stores? Online? And, I had to decide if The Tea Alchemist was going to be PART of what I do or ALL of what I do.
There is so much about The Tea Alchemist that I love. I love creating the tea blends. I love personally blending the teas. I love designing the tea labels and packaging. I love writing handwritten notes to customers. And I love talking with people about tea. To grow this business, after a certain point, I would need to give up most of the tasks I’ve been doing from early on. I haven’t been willing to give up most of those things. Also, I love my work at the university, and wasn’t willing to give it up. Reflecting on all this and realizing what I really wanted made my questions about the growth of The Tea Alchemist easy to answer.
For now, I’m happy keeping this a small. homegrown business that continues to reach new tea-lovers largely by word of mouth.
We’d love to hear more about your business.
We are a very small business and we blend our teas in small batches with great care. We currently offer 24 organic tea blends, and ship orders within the United States and Canada. We have also sold wholesale to local cafes that offer our teas on their menu and I have worked with business owners to create custom teas for their brands.
We specialize in beautiful, well-balanced tea blends made from 100% organic, whole ingredients (never any oils, chemicals, or flavorings). Each of our tea blends was created with a specific intention (e.g., Be Joyful, Simplify, Get Well Rested) or inspiration (e.g., HOWL, Tiggy-Winkle, Touch of Grey) in mind, so you can choose the right tea for your mood (or for the mood you want to be in).
I am proud that we prioritize product quality, customer experience, and environment-friendly ingredients and practices. I am proud that my friends’ kids (some of my favorite customers) believe that our tea cures them when they don’t feel well. I am proud of the number of times we’ve received feedback along the lines of, “my husband never liked tea, but he can’t stop drinking yours.” I’m proud of how happy my customers are simply by looking at our teas, before even having the first sip. I’m hopeful that many of our customers are creating their own tea rituals, and that we are encouraging mindfulness practice through a shared love of tea.
Almost everything at The Tea Alchemist is done by me and my partner Danny. Danny entered the picture in 2012 and has been a huge supporter of The Tea Alchemist from day one, helping with special events and day-to-day operations. I am also grateful for the friends and family who have provided great support over the years (in exchange for only tea and sincere thanks), and for the customers who keep coming back.
One thing that sets us apart is the extreme attention and care we can give to every batch of tea we blend and every order we fill because we are a consciously small business.
What were you like growing up?
I am an only child, so for memories of me as a young child I rely a lot on my parents’ stories of what I was like and, of course, my childhood photos. Almost all the photos from my childhood are of me out in nature (hiking, holding caterpillars, just being in the woods), playing with animals (dogs, petting zoos, etc.), or doing something crafty like painting at my easel. As a teenager, I still found my way back to nature a lot, I became passionate about environmental issues, and I was obsessed with music (listening to and absorbing it, not playing myself).
Contact Info:
- Website: www.TheTeaAlchemist.com
- Email: support@theteaalchemist.com
- Facebook: www.facebook.com/theteaalchemist
Image Credit:
All of the photos are credited to Jennifer Purrenhage, except for the photo of Jennifer sipping tea (photo credit: Nisha Moodley) and the photo of Imagine tea steeping in a clear mug (photo credit: Camila Prada).
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