Teakoe

Teakoe Tea Supply Co. recently announced the launch of a four-SKU line of sparkling tea beverages. The products are packaged in 12 oz. cans and all four varieties contain 30 calories or less and 7 grams of sugar or less, thanks to the use of stevia.

These products are the sparkling counterparts to the still teas that we praised back in 2018 for their craft beer style design. 

For this line, Teakoe has launched with four varieties with each one using a different tea and flavor combination. The flavors include: Pear Garden Mint White Tea + Raw Honey, Pomegranate Hibiscus Green Tea, Pineapple Lemon Myrtle Yerba Maté and the flagship, Signature Cold Brew Black Tea.

When it comes to flavor, we think these products are largely a step up from the brand’s non-carbonated effort, at least in so much as they’ve done a better job working with stevia. This is especially true in the Pear Garden Mint White Tea and the Signature Cold Brew Black Tea thanks to the use of added raw wildflower honey. 

Here’s a rundown of the flavors:

• Signature Cold Brew Black Tea -- This variety pairs sparkling cold brewed black tea with lemon, honey and stevia. It’s the simplest and cleanest flavor of the bunch.

• Pear Garden Mint White Tea -- This is our favorite flavor of the four that we tasted. You can taste the mint, honey and white tea, and it works quite well with the carbonation.

• Pineapple Lemon Myrtle Yerba Maté -- This one starts off with some really nice pineapple and maté flavor, but we think that the stevia notes that comes through could be improved. Additionally, we think that consumers will be expecting lemon flavor, which might actually be a nice addition in place of the lemon myrtle.

• Pomegranate Hibiscus - While the aroma and first note of this product seemed a bit off, the pairing of hibiscus, pomegranate juice, lime juice and green tea works quite well. Plus, these flavors do a great job of masking the stevia, which is the only sweetener in the product.

On the outside, the line uses a gold top can and a matte finish sleeve wrap label that gives the product a clean and soft finish. 

From there, the label has a white backdrop with a dark blue cutout at the top that is presumably intended to be the Rocky Mountains. The hierarchy of the front panel is flavor name, tea type, nutritional highlights, and,at the bottom, the Teakoe logo. 

While the look definitely catches the eye, their choice of hierarchy, which requires the eye to jump around, is an issue for us. So are the number of variables that the consumer has to evaluate between each SKU: flavor, type of tea, caffeine content, calories and sugar. It’s just too much and it creates a situation where a consumer who might be open to trying sparkling tea might only be receptive to one of the flavors. 

Overall, Teakoe Fizzy Tea is one of the better tasting sparkling teas that we’ve sampled. However, we think that the approach to the flavor and tea combinations and the format of the label need refinement before this product is ready to truly reach its potential.

The most notable part about Teakoe Tea Supply’s new line of ready to drink teas is their appearance: a 12 oz. matte finish can that looks straight out of the craft beer category.

In addition to the design, the names of the product, which include Block Party Pomegranate (iced green tea), Fairway Half & Half (nitro infused), Peacemaker Pear (iced white tea), and Peg Leg Pineapple (iced yerba mate), continue the similarities. While it could potentially lead to some confusion, it’s definitely an interesting and novel approach that we haven’t seen used in the RTD tea category.

Our primary feedback on this approach is that the execution is pretty busy. There’s a lot of different typography on the can. Plus, you need to read it from the bottom up, starting with the company logo that’s the lowest element on the can. This requires your eye to jump around, which certainly reduces the overall intuitiveness of the product. Still, this is a somewhat minor point as these cans otherwise really catch the eye and are, thanks to the uniqueness of the approach, memorable.

As for the liquid inside these cans, all four of the flavors that we sampled are sweetened (at least partially) with stevia. Looking at the design of the can, which calls out “classic brewed,” we were surprised to see this as an ingredient. Even more confusing is that the flavors range from 5 to 60 calories, 1-16g of sugar, and 50-133 mg of caffeine. From our perspective, these products are potentially for very different consumers.

However, when it comes to taste, there’s definitely some work to do. All four of the flavors have the noticeable taste of stevia. Even the Fairway Half & Half, which has 16g of sugar and is also nitro infused, has an off taste to its finish and we really don’t see the benefit of the nitro. Then there’s the Peg Leg Pineapple, which further complicates things by adding monk fruit. Lastly, all of the products use flavorings for the fruit flavor, which is somewhat surprising given that some of the other ingredients, such as wildflower honey, are quite premium.

In the end, we’re just looking for some consistency -- and we think consumers will, too. In the current form, you’ll have to pick up each flavor and examine it closely, which seems like a lot to ask. What we’d suggest is this: ditch the zero calorie sweeteners (they really don’t taste good with tea) and having a consistent (or close to) level of sweetness across the line. They’ve clearly spent a lot of time an effort coming up with these products and developing the craft look of them, but the liquid inside doesn’t quite hold up.