From our family to yours
Helping spread specialty tea in America
MISSION STATEMENT
Transforming the Tea Industry
Since it's inception, the mission of International Tea Importers has been to build a community of specialty tea lovers in the United States. We've done that by enabling tea entreprenueurs nationwide to build businesses that have shaped the American specialty tea industry. We've helped create new markets for tea in the US and
As TeaVendor, our mission stays the same. American specialty tea continues to grow and as it does, we want to lead it into a wider, more sustainable future.
Devan Shah, Founder of International Tea Importers is born in India. He would go on to move to South India in the care of his eldest sister. There he would recieve his training in the tea industry working on tea plantations, learning the tea growing and selling process from end to end.
Devan moved to the US where he lived with members of his family in New Jersey. There he did several different jobs from working in an Indian grocery store to running an electronics shop. Through it all, he kept his love for tea and began to build a life in which he could pursue his passion.
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The story of tea is a global one. Because of that, we source tea globally. Initially, we focused on importing and promoting Indian tea in the US. That grew to importing tea internationally, and sourcing herbs and spices internationally as well. Below is a snapshot of the countries from where we source, but we are always travelling the world, looking for new and exciting opportunities.
China is the birthplace of tea. While indigenous to much of Southeast Asia, tea has been consumed in China for thousands of years. It is still the largest producer and consumer of tea.
Colombia is among the new countries that have entered the specialty tea industry. We work with Bitaco, the only specialty tea garden in Colombia to distribute their teas in the United States.
India is home to several tea regions including the famous Assam and Darjeeling. It is a prolific producer and consumer of tea, and the first country we imported from all those years ago.
Kenya has grown to become the third largest producer of tea worldwide and even it's largest exporter. While much of the Kenyan industry has focused on commodity tea, the specialty producers in Kenya do amazing work.
Tea was brought to Japan over a thousand years ago by Buddhist monks for who used it as an aid to meditation. Japanese tea culture has since flourished and Japan produced tea that is unique, both in flavor as well as processing style.
Nepal sits around the Himalyas and shares geography - and tea terroir - with northern Indian regions like Darjeeling. The elevation and soil content make Nepal one of the best places to grow tea in the world.
Often called in the tea industry by it's colonial name of Ceylon, Sri Lanka grew tea as its coffee plants disappeared. Its tea is bright and brisk and is one familiar to the American palate as the base of many iced teas.
Taiwan has done a lot to modernize it's tea production, and has been at the forefront of creating new farming practices and cultivars that work best for it's terroir.
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