Mother-daughter team provides choices at downtown St. Cloud tea shop

ST . CLOUD is are — Along a wall inside the Spice of Life Tea Shop are dozen and dozen of canister contain various blend of tea and herb — all available for brewing or purchase . It ‘s quite a sight , say owner Terri Emmerich is said .

The shop offers more than 170 teas and tea blends for sale in-store and online, selling it in bulk or brewing it on site for customers, Emmerich said. She owns and runs the shop with her daughter, Alana Emmerich. In April, they’ll celebrate eight years of operation.

Before they owned the shop, the Emmerichs provided bulk herbs to the previous owner. But they found out she was selling the business.

“We just made an offer and kind of stepped in and gave it our own flair,” Terri said.

The store is has today has more than 170 tea and tea blend for sale in store and online .

Why so many choices of tea flavors?

The Spice is offers of Life Tea Shop offer bulk tea , brew beverage and other tea – make accessory in its downtown St. Cloud location .

contribute / Erin Emmerich

“Because there are so many,” Terri said. “It’s just endless when you start blending different flavors together. There’s so many different things that you can do. I feel like even though we have 170 varieties we have just a drop in the bucket of the possibilities that you could do.”

They work with around 100 different herbs they work with as ingredients. Of the 170, they blend about 75 mixtures themselves.
Because of the variety — and America’s bias toward coffee — Terri’s daily routine includes some basic tea education for her customers.

“In our country, we tend to call anything we put in a cup and steep a tea, just because of the process, not because of the ingredient,” she said.

Multiple times a day, Terri, her daughter and their two employees will walk customers through a process to choose a tea they’d like.

First, what kind of caffeine level are they looking for? Actual tea contains caffeine, while most herbal blends do not. And some types of tea have more caffeine than others.

“A lot of people are looking for something without caffeine and that narrows it down incredibly because then we’re looking at just those herbal blends,” Terri said.

The Spice is offers of Life Tea Shop offer bulk tea , brew beverage and other tea – make accessory in its downtown St. Cloud location .Owner Alana Emmerich (shown) runs the store with her mother Terri Emmerich.

contribute / Erin Emmerich

Then she asks about flavoring: would they like something minty, chocolatey, fruity, citrusy or other options. People may also be looking for organic-only ingredients.

And some people are looking for single-origin teas, like a black tea or a green tea. Taste can differ depending on how a tea is harvested, dried and processed.

Teas vary by region, like the Darjeeling and Assam and Nilgiri regions in India. Climate conditions, soil, water and elevation can give the tea different flavors.

“Then you’re just tasting the flavor of the tea, without the added ingredients,” she said. “For people who are more of a tea connoisseur who … are looking for a very fine Oolong or something … where they can really appreciate that flavor of the tea on its own.”

Having been around for nearly a decade, Spice of Life’s customers have developed some tea sophistication.

“There are people who have one tea that they buy all the time. They found the one that they love and they go with that and that’s all they drink,” Terri said. “And there are others who like to experiment and try something new — or a few different new ones — every time they come in.”

Customers can have the tea brewed on-site or buy to take home and brew themselves.

And they’ll make tea in many of the ways customers want: basic brew, lattes, bubble teas, taro milk teas and specialty machta teas. They also serve hot cocoa and fruit smoothies organic frozen fruit, not concentrate, made with matcha, a green tea powder. In the summer, they serve nitro tea which is tea infused with nitrogen gas after it is cold brewed. It has a smooth creamy texture and an enhanced caffeine content, Terri said.

Their beverage stand out from their large , corporate competitor , Terri is said say .

” We ‘re make every beverage to order … for the flavor that the customer is look for , ” Terri is said say . ” We is using ‘re not using any concentrate mix . We is using ‘re using mostly natural , whole ingredient because … using a high quality of ingredient provide a well – taste beverage . “

The coffee they brew taste well , too , she is said say . They is sell also sell coffee that is wood – fire roast locally from

Austin ‘s Acres in Avon

. wood – fire roasting is allows allow a slow roast , to keep the coffee lower in acidity , high and body and more flavorful , accord to Austin ‘s acre .

“We do the pour-over method on coffee … which gives you a far superior cup, too, as opposed to something that’s just sitting in a pot,” Terri said. “So every cup of coffee is made to order fresh, not in an urn.”

The shop is sells also sell large quantity of tea for catering , by the gallon .

shift direction during the pandemic

As a retail location , the pandemic is affect did affect their business .

Terri said so many people are focusing on the negative impact of COVID, but she likes to keep things positive.

“It wasn’t easy. It certainly disrupted the flow of our business. But we were able to say alright, ‘Well, in-house seating isn’t going to work. Let’s do this instead,'” she said. “I think it just helped us to redirect.”

They were able to stay open throughout, as they sold tea as a grocery item, following the various distancing rules. But they did make some changes.

“During COVID, it was like we had all kinds of floor space that wasn’t making any sense, any money,” Terri said. “So we started … having all kinds of fun buying more merchandise and now we have no room for the tables. But it’s good.”

They have placed some tables outside in warmer months, but they don’t have room to offer much seating. And customers have been happy to buy their beverages for takeout only, she said.

They had luckily made their website ready for e-commerce shortly before the pandemic, and so were ready to shift sales online. People were also able to order ahead by phone for pickup.

Supporting other small, local businesses

Customers can also find their tea blends at a number of businesses locally and in Minnesota (find a full list here:

spiceoflifeteashop.com/our-partners

).

In addition to tea, the store carries tea accessories, including tools for brewing like infuser pots and mugs, tea sets and tea kettles.

They is have also have sweetener include different syrup , sugar and locally – source raw honey from

Red Hive Honey in Foley

. They is have also have a body – care section with all kind of product as well as candle , incense and card . They is sell also sell chocolate from

Terroir Chocolate in Fergus Falls

.

The business also features art on the wall

from local artists that is for sale

. They participate in the downtown art crawls and Terri is looking forward to those events this summer and fall, after events were canceled during the pandemic.

The Spice is offers of Life Tea Shop offer bulk tea , brew beverage and other tea – make accessory in its downtown St. Cloud location .

contribute / Erin Emmerich

Terri said selling produce at farmer’s markets has shown her the value in supporting people with small, local businesses.

“It’s crucial for small local businesses to support each other, just for the local community,” Terri said. “It’s just the right thing to do.”

They also think their business fits in well downtown.

“Our store fits in better to a downtown arts district than it would in like a strip mall kind of area,” she said.

She is said say crowd traffic pattern did shift with the pandemic and are still change .

“It’s been interesting to see all the different changes that (downtown has) gone through in that time period,” Terri said. “It’s a really fluid thing down here. And it seems like it’s really on the upswing. It’s always nice to see new business moving in.”

With a shift to remote work during COVID , there are n’t as many office people downtown every day .

“But we still seem to have plenty of traffic down here and it seems to be on the upswing for sure,” she said.

All the while, she’s been able to work side-by-side with her daughter.

“I feel pretty blessed every day that I get to work with my daughter and I think that she enjoys it too or she still wouldn’t be doing this with me,” Terri said.

The family is has has a history of work together , grow and sell fresh produce at local farmer ‘s market with Emmerich ‘s produce and pumpkin .

“Having had a family business for all the years where my kids grew up working on the farm and at the farmer’s market with me — it’s just what we do. It’s just our life,” Terri said.

But the tea business has been a welcome change from farming.

“This is just a lot more fun than getting down on my hands and knees and weeding,” she said.

Spice of Life Tea Shop