Angry Alpaca expanding into coffee
Loose leaf tea makers excited to add new products
The Angry Alpaca is no longer all about tea.
The River Hebertbased loose leaf tea company is expanding its horizons with a line of coffee products.
It’s an exciting new endeavour for owners Albert and Danielle Agar.
“Last year and the year prior, we had been vendors at the Pugwash farmers’ market,” Danielle tells Cumberland Wire. “We would brew tea to sell at the market; either hot tea or cold tea, and we always had people coming up to us, you know, asking about coffee. It was a natural transition to add that to our line.”
The Angry Alpaca is launching the coffee products this month.
They currently have a light roast called City Lights and a medium roast called Beam Me Up.
Saturday, April 9, from 10 a.m. to 3 p.m., My Home Mercantile in Truro will be hosting an open house, and the Angry Alpaca will be present to share its new coffee.
The Angry Alpaca is, of course, most known for tea.
The Agars started the business in 2015 when they were still living in London, Ont. According to Danielle, the two were big tea drinkers at the time — Albert even more so than her.
However, they were finding that a lot of the tea available had artificial flavours and artificial sweeteners within the loose tea. To get the quality product they were looking for, they would have to travel to somewhere like Toronto.
They decided to take it upon themselves instead to source quality ingredients and to make blends they and other consumers would enjoy. They were able to launch the business after Danielle completed a small business program offered by the provincial government.
They sourced the teas from wholesalers as it can be difficult to grow tea properly in a Canadian climate.
In 2019, the couple moved to River Hebert. Although they had lived in London, according to Danielle, they were each from small towns and had always dreamed of moving back to a small town or the countryside.
The East Coast turned out to be the right place. When their kids were younger, Danielle explains, they took a family trip to the East Coast and fell in love with it.
“Fell in love with everything — the scenery, the slow pace of life, the friendliness of everyone,” she says. “For a few years we had talked about. If it doesn't work out buying someplace in Ontario, we would always love to move to the East Coast somewhere.”
They had also toured Nova Scotia on their honeymoon and that drew them to the place even more. They started looking at properties and found exactly what they were looking for in River Hebert. At their new home, they have continued to source teas from wholesalers. But it has provided them new opportunities to diversify their product line.
With seven acres of land on their property, they’re now able to grow more of their ingredients at home, such as chamomile, mint, rose petals, lavender and more.
“We’re picking them, harvesting, drying them and adding them,” says Danielle. “Actually, one of the teas we make, all of the ingredients are grown on our own and that’s our sleepy time. It’s called the Lucid Dreamer.”
Even outside of their tea business, they can grow more fruits and vegetables than they could in London and they even have chickens and goats.
“There are just lots of places to grow and to explore,” Danielle adds.
The Angry Alpaca also wants to help others.
They have donated some of the proceeds from teas they have released over the last couple years to different charities. For example, last year they released a tea called We Rise Again. They donated the proceeds from that tea to the We Rise Again fund to re-build the Portapique Community Centre.
The packaging art was done by a local artist Joy Laking. In fact, the art on all Angry Alpaca packages is done by a different Canadian artist and includes their information on the packaging, as well as a note on where consumers can view more of the artist’s work.
Danielle felt it was mutually beneficial for both the Angry Alpaca and the artist. For the former, they get to have high quality art to help promote their product, while it helps promote the artist’s work.
Angry Alpaca’s coffee is available at the Maritime Mosaic, located at Dayle’s Grand Market.
It will also be available at the Pugwash Farmers’ Market when it opens in May.
The Angry Alpaca’s tea line is available at the Maritime Market, My Home Mercantile in Moncton and Truro, Jamieson’s General Store in Tatamagouche, the Crafty Shore in Tatamagouche, the Trainyard General Store in Dartmouth, the Sunrise Country Store in Port Howe, and Abstract Coffee in Amherst.
To learn more about the Angry Alpaca visit the @angryalpaca Facebook page or their website, angry alpaca coffee and tea. square. site.