Oakland's Bottled Iced Tea: SolidariTEA

Meet Oakland entrepreneur's Trey and Christine of SolidariTEA. We love the mission behind their business.  Owning an ethical business is difficult and so important.  Please try to support your small local community who are trying to make a difference in the world through the business.  You can meet them in person on Monday, April 18 for our Monday Community night.  Make your reservation today.  Cheers, Jennifer

Inspiration

In the spring of 2011, my sweetheart Trey and I were planning a gathering of friends from our community organizing circle: always the one for cheesy jokes, I suggested, “Why don’t we invite everyone over for cookies and... solidari-tea?” We both initially laughed at the idea, but something in the name deeply resonated with us --- and it stuck.

As an environmental educator working in the nonprofit sector, I had grown frustrated with the financial culture of many nonprofits, and what I saw as the restrictions and politics with which many traditional grants were saddled. Trey, meanwhile, was deeply embedded in the cancer research world. A cancer survivor himself, much of his personal research has explored using food as medicine.

Something clicked for us & solidariTEA was born: a social venture bottled iced tea company. Ten cents from each bottle funds revolving, unrestricted grants for local arts & justice organizations. It’s our way of building and strengthening community through food, inside and out.

What makes you different?

Our motto is “Strong tea for strong community”: we brew vegan, ready-to-drink teas that provide an alternative source of funding for local nonprofits. Our Black Rose Ceylon, Blueberry Rooibos, and Cinnamon Peach feature small farm, fair trade tea leaves through Equal Exchange; organic botanicals & spices; and fun, complex profiles.

Our current nonprofit partners are the Rock Paper Scissors Collective -- a volunteer-run, community art-education space -- & People's Grocery, an amazing food justice organization; both are out of Oakland. These grants are unrestricted and revolving: once fully funded, our partners will help choose the next round of homegrown nonprofits. In the meantime, they are part of our Advisory Board and are free to use the money raised on anything that fits within their scope and mission: programming, student stipends, supplies, office rent, etc. We hope that as we -- and, in turn, these grants -- grow, that this type of grant funding will free up nonprofits to do the incredible work they do so well.

Mission

We see communities as the societal equivalent of an ecosystem -- in that they provide for and enrich our daily lives. The stronger and healthier the community, the better it will be able to serve and support its members. So we need communities that are equitable, sustainable, and joyful, that reflect the needs of all its people who live, work, and love here. We need resilient communities --- ones that are able to bounce back, even thrive, in a shifting world, because all of our lives and struggles are bound up together.

We’re thrilled to report that we’ll be making our second contribution to our partners later this spring, for a total of $7,500 since we first began selling teas. While we understand this is small potatoes now, as we scale up our business we expect the speed at which we're able to fundraise to quicken, and for our teas to represent a real source of stable income to our partners to continue the amazing, grassroots work they do. Until then, we do our best to participate and provide partner support in other ways as well, such as helping out at community events, donating teas, etc.

Where can we find you?

Our teas can be mostly found at high-end, natural food stores in the Bay — ranging north from Sacramento, as far east as Reno, to the South Bay & Santa Cruz. They can also be found at select, independent cafes and restaurants, community movie theaters, and online through grub market.com and goodeggs.com.

Spreading Community and Compassion

SolidariTEA grew from a deep wealth of love and respect we have for the many justice and arts organizations here in the Bay Area, and the communities they’re a part of. Our entire being, as a company, was inspired by our community, and the many change-makers & boundary-breakers we’ve had the great pleasure to meet and work with — the heartbeats of our neighborhoods.

And “compassion” definitely walks hand-in-hand with “solidarity” — of working in partnership with community because our collective liberation & happiness is bound up in our shared struggles.

Tips for living a more compassionate life

It’s so often the simple things that make the most powerful reverberations —

Being neighbors to everyone we meet: smiling more; being fully present in conversations; giving (appropriate) compliments to random strangers; recognizing the unseen/unknown struggles and stories within everyone, and finding compassion for those.

Voting with your dollar, when you can, and giving of your time: supporting local, small businesses and organizations whose values & mission align with yours, who are working to create a more resilient Bay, a more equitable world. As Alice Walker best said, “Activism is my rent for living on the planet."

And lastly, taking care of ourselves: self-care and practicing self-love are radical acts, too. It is from treating ourselves with love, and giving our minds & our bodies moments to breathe and move and heal, that we can access our most generous and open selves with others.

Trey Jalbert, PhD

co-founder, solidariTEAwww.solidaritea.comsolidariTEA supports Bay Area justice and art through the sale of delicious, organic iced teasFollow us on FB, Twitter, & Insta!