Earth Day Birthdays!!

We are extremely pleased to announce that Rosalyn Grant, had a little baby girl this morning. So excited for Jesse & Rosalyn that they had a 7lb. healthy, and according to her father, beautiful baby girl. Of course she would be beautiful. Rosalyn had the baby naturally & without any drugs, just like she wanted. It is extra impressive, that she was working at siptea until the 10th of April! All I can say is, WOW & that we are so happy for her. Can't wait to see the new little baby girl, who is now sharing a birthday with me & the earth.
Our Earth Day Green tea discount was a success & we gave away chico bags to customers who brought in their own cups. Kudos to you who made the extra Earth Day effort!
Thanks to our great customers & Rosalyn for making this a very special Earth Day indeed!

Educating & Adapting

Yesterday a woman came in and ordered a green tea, I will clarify, a tropical pineapple green tea. We do have lots of people come in for green tea. Unlike the grocery store there is not just one "green" tea, we have a few, and that confuses some people, because they do sell tea called "green" tea in the grocery store, right next to the box labeled, tea. She gets her tropical pineapple and asked if it could be made hotter. I said it was steeped at a lower temp. because of the type of tea it is, so it isn't bitter. She just wanted it hotter & asked to microwave it, which we don't have. So the conversation continued with her asking if she came in & asked for it made with hotter water, would I do that? I replied, I would warn you it would be bitter & would probably suggest a tea that is made with hotter water. She seemed to be testing me to see if I would make a bad cup of tea if I was asked to, the final answer is yes. That is the art of tea, you can make it any way you like, I would just like people to have tea prepared the way it is recommended first, then they can make it anyway they want. I am trying to educate as well as serve the community.
Being adaptable is the only way to survive & I would give any customer what they want, after saying my disclaimer. Another way we are adapting is that we are going to change our hours. Starting May 5th we will be open from 10am to 6pm Tuesday through Friday, with Saturday & Sunday hours staying the same, 11am to 6pm. The economic downturn has been rough on everyone & to stay here and survive we need to adapt and shorten our hours. Hopefully in 6 months we will be open longer hours.

Happy Easter & Passover

Flowers from my yard.

random acts of destruction

I just don't understand some people. We have 2 rolling planters outside our storefront. They have been there 6 days a week for 6 months now. We get occasional trash thrown in, now more than ever since the trash can on the street corner was removed. What is up with that LA? Bring our trash can back, but that is another story. Today I look out to see that someone has uprooted a plant in the planter. The vine that goes up the trellis is out of the soil & laying on the table next to it & when I investigate further, another plant, the vinca is also uprooted & left on the rock mulch. WTF people? Why would someone rip a plant out of the soil? It took some force, because they broke some of the roots. And on Easter Sunday to boot! Come on, I just don't understand, they didn't even take the plants with them. That is what they do in my neighborhood, just steal the plants with a shovel. This was just random destruction of plant life. It makes me sad & I hope that it doesn't kill the plant. I replanted it, but with the roots torn it could cause problems. Arrgh! Let's hope it doesn't die & becomes the Easter vine.

Thanks to Jessica Needleman

Today we had some people stop by from the Eastern Columbia building. They didn't even know we were here, been here six months, directly across from them, but they never had seen our storefront. Jessica Needleman, who is the daughter of Steve Needleman who owns the 9th & Broadway building (where siptea is located), the Orpheum Theater & all the Anjac Fashion buildings you see in Los Angeles, sent them an email. So nice that people are watching out for us, we a small place, and don't have a large advertising budget, so any help we get is just wonderful. So here is a public thank you to Jessica for promoting us to the neighborhood.

Coupons

So trying to spread the word in downtown about siptea. We got some postcards made, with recycled paper, and now are making them into coupons by putting stickers on them. The stickers are also recycled and it makes the postcards very adaptable & hopefully they will end up in the hands of happy tea drinkers and not in trash/recycling bins.
Only 21 days until earthday, which ironically is my actual birthday! Seems I was born to be green.
If you start stopping by siptea, we have a frequent buyer program, so ask us about it & we will start you on your way to a free tea.
On a happy & sad note, Rosalyn is going to be leaving us soon to have her baby & enjoy the joys of motherhood full-time.
We are planning to do a green event for earthday & it is also going to be Fiesta Broadway on the 26th of April, so are thinking we should get some green/eco info set up to give out to the hispanic community.
If anyone has any ideas on green companies or products that need an outlet, hook me up, would love to make this a great community event.