Mary Lowisz of Sun Prairie has been thinking about tea for a long time. In fact, one of her favorite memories is spending afternoons with her sister at a tea house in her native Detroit, sipping carefully steeped brews while indulging in delicate finger sandwiches and sweets. 

With the help of her business partner Jack Herbert, Lowisz’s fondness for tea grew into a business in 2021. Today Herbert and Lowisz are working directly with tea growers in the Republic of Georgia and sourcing other tea and spices from around the world. 

They now sell loose-leaf teas, tisanes and drink blends to customers across the country through their virtual tea shop, Chai House.

Teas to stay home with 

“Having my own little tea shop was my plan B,” said Lowisz, while drinking a fresh, warm cup of Chai House’s Madison Masala #17 Chai in her home. “I was considering a new career, doing something completely different to supplement my income during retirement.” 

A clinical nurse specialist, Lowisz was looking forward to a change from the long hours and physical demands of caring for patients. She thought a tea shop would be just the thing. But everything changed in an instant when the COVID-19 pandemic hit in 2020. 

“We realized that the timing could not be worse for opening an in-person tea house,” Lowisz said. 

The pair decided to move their tea business online. “It was a smaller financial investment up front, and much less risky,” she said, although she doesn’t rule out the possibility of opening a shop of their own in the future. 

Herbert didn’t know much about tea when the two friends started talking about potential business ideas five years ago. But he did have an interest in travel, a passion for research and an essential skill set to get the venture off the ground — marketing. 

With an MBA and a decades-long career in sales and marketing for manufacturing industries, Herbert had experience doing market research, building brand identities and creating business plans. What began as a favor for a friend quickly turned into a business partnership, helped along by serendipity. 

Discovering Georgian tea

At the same time he was mulling over ideas for new business ventures, Herbert visited the Republic of Georgia for a friend’s family wedding. He fell in love with the landscape, the culture, the food and the people he met in the former Soviet country, and discovered that Georgia had a long history of growing tea. 

The small country that borders Russia, Turkey and the Black Sea had supplied tons of world-class teas to Russian markets while under communist control. After the collapse of the Soviet Union in the early 1990s, many tea farms lay fallow without state support, but the tea plants continued to grow wild. 

These revelations led to a scouting trip to Georgia in the fall of 2020 where Lowisz and Herbert met directly with representatives from the Georgian Organic Tea Producers Association (GOTPA). A cooperative of family tea farmers headquartered in Tbilisi, they specialize in producing high quality, organic orthodox teas. 

After spending several days visiting farms, learning about tea production and sampling the teas from the region, Herbert and Lowisz left the country with two huge suitcases packed with loose-leaf tea. 

Since then, the pair has worked with other organic, fair trade tea farmers around the world, in Tibet, Africa, India, Nepal, Indonesia and Japan. Along the way they have amassed a wealth of knowledge about growing, drying, processing and brewing tea for the most flavorful results. 

Herbert and Lowisz also developed a business philosophy articulated in their mission statement; to spread the joy of tea while creating good for people and good for the planet. 

“There’s a lot of us in this venture,” Herbert explained. “We were looking for ways to express our faith through our business. So we work to be ethical and honest in all our business dealings and give back to organizations we care about.” 

Part of those good works includes giving a percentage of the proceeds of each tea sale to a nonprofit organization, such as St. Ignatius Antiochian Orthodox Church and the Dane County Humane Society. 

Taking time for tea

Though plans for a brick and mortar Chai House were disrupted by the pandemic, Herbert said the quarantine dramatically impacted tea sales in the U.S. 

“There are lots of new tea drinkers now, thanks to the pandemic,” he said. “People were working from home, which meant they had time to brew tea. In the midst of a health crisis, they were also looking for medical benefits that could come from tea and craving comfort in their food and drink. 

“It was a period when people slowed down, took a breath and took time to have a leisurely cup of tea and a conversation. Obviously we hope that continues.”

A cup of tea can transform from a beverage choice to a passion. Georgian Forest White Tea ($16-$28/1.4 ounce) had a very light green in color in the cup, with a fresh, subtle, earthy taste. Georgian Forest Wild Black Tea ($16/1.4 ounce) was much darker and more assertive, with added body and a small bump of caffeine.

Miran’s Emerald Dream tisane ($14/1.4 ounce) tasted both delicious and completely unique. The combination of rose buds, mint leaves, mint flowers, butterfly pea flowers, lavender petals and mandarin peel creates a blue-green tea when brewed, with refreshing mint and floral notes.

And their Madison Masala #17 Chai ($10/1.59 ounce) is now my go-to mix for a smooth, gently spicy Indian beverage I can make at home. Combined with Kanchanjangha Noir Black Tea ($10/1.4 ounce), brown sugar, water and oat milk, it is the perfectly balanced, silky chai that I love on cold, gray days.

A companion spice mix, Green Bay Golden Milk ($10/1.59 ounce) was less sweet but still soothing, made with turmeric, black pepper, ginger, cardamom and cinnamon. The gold colored beverage with flavors reminiscent of curry is known as “haldi doodh” in India.

All of Chai House’s products are available on its website, and a portion of those offerings can be purchased at Fresh Mart, an international grocer in Sun Prairie. For more information about available teas and spice mixes, visit Chai House’s Facebook page (ChaiHouseLLC).