Yaupon Brothers American Tea Co. to start crowdfunding on Wefunder platform

Edgewater-based Yaupon Brothers American Tea Co. is starting its next round of funding — this time taking it to the community on the Wefunder platform, which is like "Kickstarter for investing."

The company recently held a week-long private community round raising $136,000, according to a news release.

Why this matters: Yaupon Brothers American Tea Co. is set to start growing its brand, which means more jobs potentially could be created in the Orlando area.

“Traditional VC is not the right fit for every company, and it has been difficult to raise capital from local VCs, so we’re excited to offer the opportunity for our community of supporters to own a piece of what we’re building,” said Yaupon Brothers American Tea Co. co-founders Kyle and Bryon White in a prepared statement.

They created the company in 2015 along with their mentor Mark Steele.

People interested in investing can exchange at least $100 for future company equity. Leading this round and representing the community investors is Jacques Fu, co-founder of Stax, a Orlando-based unicorn fintech form, according to a news release.

“I believe they can disrupt the American tea industry with this native plant, which is America’s only caffeine source,” Fu said in a prepared statement. “The tea market in the USA is a massive opportunity for growth and innovation since there are virtually no domestically produced caffeinated tea products, and the category does not see many new or exciting products with this kind of potential for growth.”

Yaupon Brothers American Tea Co. makes a tea product from the Florida native Yaupon Holly, the only native plant in the U.S. that contains caffeine. Yaupon provides farmers with a sustainable low-cost, high-profit crop.

Yaupon Brothers American Tea plans to amp up marketing with this community round of funding, which will give the brand runway to expand its product — by offering a sixth tea blend to its main line of teas.

“It’s never easy to raise investment dollars for a consumer packaged goods company and we’ve managed to get this far with investments mainly from friends and family. But to scale the business and position ourselves to take a piece of the nearly $13 billion a year imported tea business with a 100% American made product, we need to continually be raising capital,” they said.

Meanwhile, according to a report by the Tea Association, tea is one of the most consumed drinks in the world and it can be found in around 80% of U.S. households. The report also said Americans drank more than 85 billion servings of tea in 2021.

“We’re not just building an American Yaupon tea company, we and a handful of other Yaupon producers are quite literally building the American Yaupon tea industry. We’re cultivating the Yaupon trees, we’re planting them, we’re farming them, we’re wild harvesting, we’re doing all the things. So when you invest in Yaupon Brothers, you’re investing in a vertically integrated and pioneering Yaupon tea company that is scalable. We believe the returns to our investors will be as refreshing as our teas,” said Kyle and Bryon White.

Yaupon Brothers American Tea Co.

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