The friends who turned a career tasting a million teas into their own business

Mark Lawson and Giles Oakley are the co-founders of tea company Two Spoons. Starting their careers at Tetley, the two friends have travelled the world and tasted more than a million teas.

After leaving the corporate world they joined forces to create their own brand. With no experience of launching a business, Mark and Giles looked for help and found expert advice through the Amazon Small Business Accelerator.

Here, Mark shares the story of Two Spoons.

The free Amazon Small Business Accelerator e-learning programme is advice from more than 30 business experts in over 200 bitesize videos.

If you're already an Enterprise Nation member, log in to your learning dashboard. If you're not an Enterprise Nation member, you can join the Amazon Small Business Accelerator for free here.

How did you come up with your business idea?

"We started our careers as trainee tea tasters at Tetley. Effectively it was a five-year apprenticeship that included spending a year in tea-producing countries Kenya, Malawi, Sri Lanka and India.

"We learned all aspects of the tea industry from sourcing, buying, blending and getting involved in new product development. Tasting underpins everything to ascertain a tea's quality and value.

"I joined another tea business called Finlays that grows tea in Kenya, Argentina, Sri Lanka and China. We both knew we wanted a change and decided independently to leave the corporate world behind.

"We decided to launch our own tea brand, Two Spoons, named after the tools of our trade – our tasting spoons. We reckon between us we've tasted more than a million teas! Tea is a bit of an unsung hero so we wanted to tell its story and the passion that goes into your daily cuppa.

"We had a strong network from years in the industry, from growers to people who import and blend tea in the UK, and had a good idea of the individual, great-quality teas and blends we wanted to sell in both loose leaf and 'pillow' format – our nicer term for teabags!

"Using our skills as tea tasters and blenders we curate a delicious range of teas. We've kept our range relatively simple but with a ruthless focus on excellent quality.

"We were rewarded early on in our adventure by winning two Great Taste Awards for our signature English Breakfast-style tea called Bungalow Blend, and our Peppermint Tea. We've entered more this year as our range has grown to include Green Tea, Earl Grey and a 1st Flush Darjeeling. We also get excellent reviews on Trustpilot from our customers, which spurs us on."

What start-up challenges have you faced?

"There have been many challenges from the bureaucracy of starting a business – the form filling and ensuring that all the relevant boxes are ticked through to waiting for an urgent label order to arrive only to open the box to discover someone's Christmas chocolates and slippers – don't ask!

"Keeping a constant eye on cash flow has been a challenge too. We haven't taken loans or received any investment yet so this has been a source of concern at times and we've had to inject our own cash to keep going. To counterbalance that, we've had a lot of local support from customers in the food service sector and this side of the business is growing.

"We were social media novices when we started and even now have had issues with Facebook that are still unresolved.

How has Amazon Small Business Accelerator e-learning programme inspired you?

"It's very different using social media for business purposes. The videos covering social media and content helped us to hone in on our 'why' and to think about what would be appealing to our target audience, starting with identifying that target audience. We don't want to take ourselves too seriously, but it is important to get across that we are tea experts who know tea inside and out.

"Before starting Two Spoons we'd not heard of the term a 'call to action' but we have now! Thinking about how to persuade potential customers to buy is front of mind in all our communications.

"The video giving advice on making the most of a website's 'about us' page was also useful. Our story is that we are professional tea tasters, so to get that across is important."

What's your strategy for marketing and reaching customers?

"We send a monthly email newsletter to customers that is informative and fun. We want to get across that we don’t take ourselves too seriously.

"We're getting better at consistency and presence on social media – putting our personalities across and emphasising that we're real experts in tea having worked in the trade for a combined 50 years. We use the #FromRealTeaTasters hashtag.

"We've also exhibited at lots of local markets and food festivals to get our name out there. It's been great meeting customers and talking tea. There have been some great coincidences at these events too. For example, we met the godfather of one of our tea producer friends in Africa!"

Tell us about your sustainability strategy.

"From the get-go we wanted the products to be plastic-free and industrially compostable, which we achieved even though it cost us more. And we only buy from accredited tea estates that we know personally.

"The tea industry has done a good job over the years of putting a great deal of emphasis on sustainability such as creating the Ethical Tea Partnership.

"We also chose to support Lindengate, a local horticultural charity that uses nature to help people with their mental health and wellbeing, which seemed a good fit with tea which is a botanical. We donate the proceeds from giving talks and presentations to the local community to Lindengate."

Which other entrepreneurs inspire you and why?

"My father-in-law has been a source of inspiration over the years. He owned and ran a successful chartered accountancy practice. He's retired now but he's still very involved with a business. He has always managed to combine a strong work ethic with a lot of fun too. I think that balance and positivity has kept him invigorated.

"For Giles, it's David Begg from Real Kombucha. He turned a fermented tea drink into something desirable, tapping into the trend for an adult drink to replace alcohol."

What are your top tips for business success?

"Keep it simple! It's so easy to overcomplicate things and become distracted. Keep returning to your initial plan.

"Ask for help. People are generally very willing to support you. Use resources such as Enterprise Nation and the other wealth of start-up information online."

The free Amazon Small Business Accelerator e-learning programme is advice from more than 30 business experts in over 200 bitesize videos.

If you're already an Enterprise Nation member, log in to your learning dashboard. If you're not an Enterprise Nation member, you can join the Amazon Small Business Accelerator for free here.