The Challenge:
It's hard to imagine a time before gourmet teas. It really existed. There was a time when Whole Food was just on the West Coast, too. There were only a handfull of gourmet markets. Tea was mostly monopolized by Lipton, Twinings, and Celestial Seasonings. Tea was just a dark bag in a cup of water. A few of us gravitated together under the vision of Will Rosenzweig, Mel and Patricia Ziegler - founders of Banana Republic. We heard their calling - letters to each other - product visionaries that they were - that tea could be something inspiring, something deeper, and even something very spiritual. Somehow, we had to come up with a visual experession of these ideas - in a package that people would want to pick up on a shelf and buy. Right, and it needed to cost about $10.
Creative Director, Nancy Bauch led the exploration that led to experimenting with new package forms and vastly different visuals than mainstream consumers had seen on supermarket shelves. After much research in containers, we settled on a high-quality cyllindrical tin that had an airtight lid. Made in Japan, these were tins used by tea afficinados to store tea for long-periods of time. A very functional device, the tin offrered a range of labeling opporutnities. The Identity was developed out of a historic hand-drawn typeface. The symbolic teapot sits on top of photographic collages that are crafted and assembled by hand to align with the mysterious effect each tea has on its drinker. The company has since gone on to be sold and repurchased several times and today enjoys the care it deserves. The company features a variety of tea lines ranging from the original 25 to revolutionary herbal medicinal teas. Of course, the competition has increased since the Republic of Tea launched and there are a multitude of tea companies on supermarket shelves today. Happily, the Republic of Tea maintains its quality and committment to the highest quality full leaf teas and herbs.
