How to Open a Boba Tea Shop

1. Franchising

Franchising is the easiest way to open a boba tea shop after you’ve passed the application and background check processes. Well-known boba tea brands like Kung Fu Tea or Gong Cha have established standards and processes to start a boba tea shop in a couple of months.

You don’t have to worry about sourcing ingredients, getting permits and licenses, marketing, and launching the business. The boba tea franchise will guide you through that during the whole process. Plus, boba tea franchises would also have guidelines for the interior designs to ensure that they are consistent with other shops.

2. Opening Your Boba Tea Shop

Opening your own boba tea shop can become a challenge since you’re starting from scratch. However, it doesn’t mean it’s not a doable task. You need time and patience to launch your own boba tea shop. Here’s what you should remember when opening one.

Naming and Identity

One of the first things to settle before launching your boba tea shop is giving it a name and identity. After all, you don’t want to be mistaken with big brand boba tea shops. Think about why you’re opening a boba tea shop and what makes it unique. This could help you identify your boba tea shop’s name along with some objectives and brand identity standards to run your boba tea shop.

Finding a Location

Selecting the right location is key to making your boba tea shop thrive. You want to ensure that your boba tea shop is strategically located in places with high foot traffic or a population interested in drinking boba. You can’t avoid competitors or other food and beverage shops since they are also attracting your target audience.

But location isn’t just about finding the right place to set up your boba tea shop. Once you’ve decided where to set up the shop, you need to survey the place where you’ll run the shop. This way, you can evaluate how to entice customers to your shop!

Sourcing Your Ingredients and Equipment

You can start this process way before establishing your boba tea shop’s name and identity. You may have been interested in making boba before deciding to set up a shop and know where to get your ingredients. However, sourcing your ingredients and equipment can come before launching your business, too!

Whenever you do this, make sure that you get ingredients from well-known suppliers to avoid any issues when making boba. Additionally, you can find boba tea shop equipment online to help you start organizing your inventory. Here are the supplies when making and storing boba:

Tea dispenser
Cup sealers
Sugar dispensers
Tea brewers
Pearl cookers

Getting Permits and Licenses

Since boba tea shops fall under food and beverage, it’s important that you get permits and licenses to operate your boba tea shop. This depends on the state, city, or municipality you want to open your boba tea shop. But having these essentials will ensure that you can smoothly run your boba tea shop and serve customers.

Finding Staff

Running a boba tea shop can be challenging for one person. That’s why you need an extra pair of hands to help you run the tea shop. You can hire one or two people to make the boba tea and take customer orders. Of course, you need to train them to ensure professionalism and friendliness.

Designing Your Boba Tea Shop

Once you’ve secured your permits and licenses to open a boba tea shop, you can finally organize and design your shop. Your boba tea shop’s design depends on the size. If it’s a small space, you can accommodate only a couple of customers to stay and enjoy their boba. However, if it’s bigger, you can invest in chairs and tables to let customers relax.

You need to find a place to buy furniture, too! Fortunately, places like Wayfair and Amazon can help you find chairs, sofas, and tables to provide customers with a wonderful drinking experience in your store.

Additionally, designing your store can be challenging, especially if you don’t have any experience. You can outsource your designs and more from Spencil to help you get started with your boba tea shop in no time!

Marketing

One last thing to remember when opening a boba tea shop is marketing it to the public. You want to promote your business so people can flock to the big opening! Plus, you want to ensure no one misses the opportunity to try your boba tea! You can set up social media accounts and ask for help from friends or others to spread the word. Additionally, you can print out flyers to share with your neighbors.

When it comes to marketing, make sure that you don’t do it only before opening your boba tea shop. You need to update your social media accounts with the latest updates and promos. Plus, you can hand out other marketing materials to entice more people to come to your shop!

Launching

The final step in opening your boba tea shop is launching it! Make sure that everything’s in place and that you have prepared all the ingredients to create the best boba. Plus, make sure that your staff is ready for the customers lining up to taste your unique boba tea!

About the author

Katrina Pascual