Leelanau Tea continues to be on the rise in 2024, taking claim of a foothold in the craft lemonade and tea industry since opening in 2021.
Leelanau Tea owner Kevin Vann said business is going well for the local beverage maker.
“We’ve probably doubled our growth … definitely doubled our sales from last year already, it’s only July,” Vann said. “Still pushing it outside of Michigan and establishing some pretty good regional stores out east and down south. A friend of mine even found it in Puerto Rico a couple weeks ago, which is interesting.”
It’s still as fun as ever for Vann as Leelanau Tea has sold roughly 200,000 bottles this year or 17,000 cases.
Vann has negotiated his way into a majority of Leelanau and Grand Traverse mercentiles. Leelanau Tea has even claimed shelf space in Meijer and Kroger. He has been able to make headway into the large corporations from building relationships and connections.
In year three of Leelanau Tea, Vann admits he hasn’t had any expectations, but has gauged his success off of Great Lakes potato chips, and their quick rise to fame.
“I had him tell me his story and what his growth milestones were; it seems like they took off a lot quicker than I did. So, I guess that’s my only litmus test … I kind of use them as a guide and I look at their website on what distributors they use,” Vann said. “I’ve also got a brand management company that I’ve been working with for the last two years … They’ve been instrumental and connected me with the right distributors in the industry.”
Vann has been focusing on his foothold with a beverage broker in Chicago and Ohio that will be the focus in 2025.
“I’m hopeful that there will be even another uptick of growth that will be exciting to talk about too,” Vann said.
Vann says Leelanau Tea is a craft based tea or lemonade that helps illustrate a beverage that is not high in cheap high fructose corn syrup imitation type of drink.
The price of Leelanau Tea hovers anywhere from $3.50 to $4.50, depending where you get it.
Vann has had to toe the fine line of inflation that has made Leelanau Tea adjust quickly. The biggest issue was handling the price of glass because he didn’t want to switch to plastic.
“Hopefully (inflation) is going to slow down and stay where it’s at so we can have some normalcy for a while,” Vann said.
Vann’s oldest, Ethan Vann, recently graduated from Leland and is heading off to business school at Michigan State University.
“I never thought that he would go,” Vann said. “I thought he was always gonna be, doing something with animals or something like that ... I would love to have the kids be involved at some point in the future if they want to come back and have it be a true family business.”
Kevin and his family were standing out at both Fourth of July parades with a massive, inflatable Leelanau Tea prop on top of his Toyota truck.
“It amazes me how many bottles of tea you have to sell in order to make a profit. It’s such a numbers game in this business ... I still get web orders from people from Texas or California who have visited, the area and have gone back home and ordered it so they can keep on having it because it’s not in their area ... That’s one of the biggest reasons why I started the business was to get people that are only able to visit here one to two weeks a year to bring it back home and experience,” Vann said.
