We Connect People,
Planet & Tea
A Letter From Our Founders:
Dear Tea Lover,
When people ask us what makes Lake Missoula Tea different, we don't talk about our blends first. We talk about the people.
We talk about the farmer in Nepal whose tea grows at one of the highest elevations in the world — and the fact that a sip of his Panda Ruby Red can take you to the Himalayas from your kitchen table. We talk about the family in Taiwan's Nantou region, at the end of a steep mountain road, whose Milk Oolong is unlike anything you've ever tasted. We talk about David in Kenya, who chose to grow artisan purple tea in a region where everyone else grows low-grade black.
These aren't vendors. They're relationships. Some of them go back over a decade.
Jake's background is in environmental activism. Heather's is in data systems and education. We started this company because we believed tea could be a vehicle for the same things we'd always fought for — fairness, sustainability, and genuine human connection. Not the kind you perform for Instagram. The kind that happens when you put down your phone, step up to a tasting bar, and let someone pour you a cup of something they personally sourced from a farm they've visited with their own two feet.
That's why there's no Wi-Fi in our teahouse. Not because we're anti-technology. Because we're pro-conversation.
Today, our business expanded from where this thing we started in 2012 as a wild idea has become a family legacy — and we wouldn't have it any other way.
We connect people and planet through tea. That's not a tagline. It's how we live.
With warmth and gratitude,
Heather & Jake Kreilick
Lake Missoula Tea Company
Sustainable
Tea Farms
Our Tea Farm Partners
Colombia
Kenya
Nepal
India
India
Indonesia
Taiwan
Australia
Japan
China
China
Montana
How It Started
The Lake Missoula Tea Company name draws inspiration from the last Ice Age when a vast glacial lake covered the Missoula Valley. During this epoch, humans and woolly mammoths migrated from Asia. This era of worldwide migration represents the power of cross-cultural relationships. Our name expounds on travel, creativity and exchange that happens when people share their experiences, and we do this with a cup of tea.
Visit Tea Farms
We've visited tea regions across Nepal, Kenya, Colombia, India, Indonesia, Taiwan, Japan, and China. We've sat in farmhouses. We've walked fields at dawn. We've met the people whose names are on our teas.
Every trip teaches us something. Every farm challenges what we thought we knew. This is how we stay honest with confidence that we offer the world’s best tea.
Montana Roots
We’re proud of our team in Montana! That means our tea tenders at our custom tea bar, our blenders and fulfillment team at our organic certified warehouse, our reps across the state and our loyal wholesale and retail customers! Each fills a niche in what comprises our Montana company!
Family Owned
We are a family owned and operated business. What started as a small tea bar in 2012 now offers online, wholesale and small batch tea blending runs out of our manufacturing facility in the heart of Missoula, MT.
The Future
Our organizational structure and systems used to fit in Heather’s head, but not anymore! Instead of doing 15 things, she now does 2. We pulled those systems out of her head and created a scalable structure. The part of the Kreilick family that grew up bagging tea is now in leadership roles. Jake is in distribution and sales with Heather. Uriah works on the nuts and bolts, Tashina steers the ship, and Violet fills in the holes.
