Success story for the local tea industry
that offered a truly innovative twist, allowing the modern consumer to view tea as delicious, trendy and exotic — just as they do coffee.
Born and raised in Johannesburg, Glass completed her higher diploma in creative communications, majoring in both art direction and brand strategy at the Vega Brand Communication School. After graduating at the top of her class, Glass joined M&C Saatchi as a junior art director. Already full of entrepreneurial ambition, she left a year later to start her own below-the-line agency with a fellow graduate. After four years, they sold it as a successful business in 2004. After staying in marketing and advertising for some time, she finally decided to go into tea.
Most of today’s tea is produced as a commodity item: cut, shredded into small pieces and bagged for easy distribution. Glass instead uses fullleaf teas from tea gardens and estates where the leaves are processed in such a way as to retain their integrity. The production strictly follows traditional manufacturing and preparation methods, and the leaves are combined, blended and packaged as a gourmet offering. The Toni Glass Collection designer teas come either as loose leaf teas or in gorgeous silk bags, which are housed in individual Afrocentric, yet contemporary, designer boxes.
According to Glass, tea needed a new angle: “Coffee, cheese and wine have all had a revamp, but tea was just ‘good old tea’ and ‘rooibos’.” Her gourmet approach to tea focuses on tea drinking as a slow, healthy, mindful and indulgent experience.
She travelled the globe, from Australia to Las Vegas, attending every possible tea seminar, course and conference, and is well on her way to becoming an official international tea master. After tasting and testing hundreds of teas from all over the world, she narrowed her selection down to eight flavours.
Her first sale was in 2009 to a small coffee shop in Johannesburg, but it demonstrated that the Toni Glass Collection had promise. Having started the business from a two-bedroom flat, she soon found it necessary to move her operation to a dedicated facility. Her first employee, Rejoyce Ncube, started as her domestic worker and is now head of receiving and dispatch at the Toni Glass Collection Food Safe facility. Glass now employs a team of 17.
The Toni Glass Collection is rapidly becoming South Africa’s premier tea brand, and is set to soon bag its share of the $70-billion global tea market.
Today the range of teas has expanded to over a hundred different hot-tea flavours, four original ice teas and four sugar-free ice teas. Teas from the Toni Glass Collection are currently available in hundreds of coffee shops, restaurants and hotels, and can also be found in many Pick ‘n Pays, Spars and independent retailers throughout the country.
In just a few years, Glass has managed to establish a loyal and wide customer base. The Toni Glass Collection was selected at the International Tea Show in 2014 as being one of the top four trendsetters in tea globally.
Glass’s current aim is to continu- ously focus on her mantra of “Full Leaf, Full Life” which aims to transform people from the inside out. She is excited to continue growing sales in South Africa, adding to her already innovative range and exploring new markets.
Glass will be able to become a fantastic role model, showing how true innovation and passion can turn a small business started from home into an international success story as she becomes a figure in her niche of fast-moving consumer goods. Find out more at www.toniglasscollection.co.za