Some businesses begin with a business plan. City Tea and Coffee began with a cup.
A cup that was not good enough. A cup that was overpriced, underwhelming, and did not come close to delivering what every tea and coffee lover in India deserves — genuine quality, honest ingredients, and a taste that actually lives up to the promise on the label.
That dissatisfaction was the beginning of everything.
The Problem We Could Not Ignore
India is one of the greatest tea and coffee producing nations in the world. We grow some of the most extraordinary teas on the planet — from the misty Darjeeling hills to the rich valleys of Assam, from the lush estates of the Nilgiris to the high-altitude gardens of the Western Ghats. We produce legendary coffees — Monsooned Malabar, single-origin Arabica, rare Peaberry — that are celebrated and sought after by connoisseurs across every continent.
And yet, for the everyday Indian tea and coffee drinker, accessing genuine quality was never easy.
The market was flooded with products that looked premium but were not. Blends that promised one thing and delivered another. Teas and coffees that relied on packaging and marketing rather than the quality of what was actually inside. And at the other end of the spectrum — the roadside tapri — there was flavor and familiarity but none of the hygiene, consistency or quality that daily drinkers genuinely deserved.
We saw that gap. And we could not look away from it.