Enjoy the best of Park City- Townshend's Tea

For the love of tea

According to Townshend's Tea, Charles Townshend (their name sake) is the reason tea is often an underdog to coffee, he penned the Tea Act which led to a widespread boycott on tea and ultimately the infamous Boston Tea Party, causing people to fill their mugs with a certain dark acidic brew and sowing the seeds of our current coffee culture. However, Polly Rhim co/owner of Townshend's Tea-Park City, is making a valiant effort to change all that. This week Polly and I sat down at the tea house over cups of delicious tea, and talked about how she brought Townshend's Tea to Utah.

How did you get in the tea business?
Well I grew up in Oregon, Townshend's has several locations up there. They have the best Chai I have ever had. And when ever I got back up there (Polly has been living in PC for 11 years) I make sure to have a cup or twelve!  I got to thinking about how nice it would be to have a Townshend's right here in PC. So, I sent an email to the owners of Townshend's and it just took off from there. Townshend's recently had a lot of success with a shop they had opened in Bozeman, Montana, and thought PC would be a great fit for Townshend's Tea. 

What kind of training did you go through?
I moved back to Oregon for six months, and trained in several of their shops. There was so much to learn about tea, the many different kinds, different ways to prepare it, and just learning about the business itself was an undertaking. So after six months of learning and training I submitted my business plan to the board at Townshend's and got the green light to go ahead. I moved back to Utah and signed the lease on the space we are in today.

How long was the build out process?
It took us six months, my parents brought all the wood from Oregon. A friend of my dad's put it together and laminated it all for the tables and counter top. We (her husband and family) worked around the clock for six months painting, installing equipment, and stocking up on tea.  Finally we opened on June 1st of this year.

So how has business been since opening?
It has been great. We had a really good summer and fall, and we have really been busy since winter hit. We already have a good customer base, with many regulars we see daily, sometimes we see them more than once during the day, which is great. We have people who come with their laptops and sit and work for hours, and we have others that come and just lounge on the couch talking, laughing, and drinking tea. We have even had a group hold their book club here, it was the perfect fit for them and for us.

You are more than just mugs of tea, what else do you have that sets you apart?
Besides our many different types of loose tea you can buy to take home, we have the largest kombucha bar in Utah, with 10 different kinds of kombucha on tap. You can enjoy it here or fill a growler to take home and enjoy. We also have our sniffer wall, where you can smell the different types of tea and learn about them from our Tea Tenders (their employees are well trained in tea). We also have a whole apothecary section to help with almost everything from allergies, and colds, to headaches and clearer skin.
I always knew Townshend's would be a good fit for PC, I love seeing the community falling for Towssnend's the way I did.