Another food delight that has made it in California, but hasn’t moved east in any significant way, is boba. This delicious Asian drink is called bubble tea, although boba and bubble tea are used interchangeably. Bubble tea originated in Taiwan; bubble tea shops have become common all over Asia and are spreading to the rest of the world. You might consider getting in on it as it becomes popular in the U.S.

Bubble tea’s name comes from the bubbling process commonly used to make some types of bubble tea. Boba refers to the balls of tapioca found at the bottom of the drink. The boba is sucked up through straws of varying sizes, depending on the size of the balls.

The tea is made in many different ways, but is typically sweet. The tapioca pearls are also sweet; their sweetness derived from ingredients such as caramel, sweet potato, and brown sugar.

As boba becomes more popular, supplies are getting easier to find. The whole operation is quite simple—the most complicated thing you need is a refrigerator and freezer to either make or store ice.

THINGS TO CONSIDER

One thing to consider is that you will be working all the time with the same product. This can get boring for some people but others may see a challenge in finding unique ways to present the same concoction. Boba tea, for instance, has spun off into smoothies and fruit drinks. Perhaps there is something else unique that can be done with tapioca pearls—bury them in custards? Cheesecake? Who’s to say coffee drinks can’t benefit from a tapioca pearl or two? The trick is not to feel like you can only do something in the way it has always been done.

HOW DO YOU WANT TO SPEND YOUR DAY?

You will spend your day mixing and pouring drinks. You’ll need to find time to do your ordering—an important task for any food business.

WHAT YOU WILL NEED

You will need the ingredients to make your boba tea, including tea and milk and perhaps fruit if you decide to offer “smoothie” type boba drinks. The tapioca pearls are a must. You will also need clear drink cups (to show off the black pearls resting at the bottom of the cup!) and the bubbled tops with the large opening to accommodate a large straw to suck up the large pearls. You will also need to provide napkins.

You can do this simple business in either a wheeled cart or other simple stand or in a very modest retail location.

There are a couple of boba franchises open, so you can consider the franchise route if you have the financing and you want a lot of the upfront business done for you already.

Since you will be operating from some kind of retail location—whether it is a small kiosk in the mall or a wheeled cart in the town square—you will need some way to take cash and make change. If you are out in the square, it would be good to have a way to still do business even in inclement weather, although you may find that even though you have shelter for your boba stand, you don’t attract enough people to make it worth your while.

MARKETING ANGLE

One important thing you will need to consider is what time of day people are inclined to buy your boba drinks. You don’t want to be out there with your stand set up at 6 a.m. to find that most tea drinkers are late afternoon purchasers. And it may be different from one area to another.

If you are in a market too small to sustain your business, and have a moveable stand, you might choose different places to be on different days. People in one area will come to know that you are there on Mondays, another on Tuesdays.

NICE TOUCH

A nice touch with your boba drinks is to offer fresh mint, especially if you begin to sell smoothie or fruit drinks. You could easily grow your own mint and clip some daily—don’t forget to wash it well!

EXPANSION POSSIBILITIES

There are several possible expansion ideas for a boba drink stand. You could add stands and hire people to run them for you, especially if you have been rotating to different markets each day and think you could now have enough customers in one market to stay there all the time. Extra stands cost more to run, because you have to stock them all and pay help, but it can significantly help your profit margin by allowing you to order supplies in larger quantities and get better discounts on your purchases.

WORDS TO KNOW

Dome lids: Plastic cup lids that are dome-shaped and usually have an oversized hole to allow the large straw typically served with boba.

Pearls: The tapioca balls that are an integral part of boba.

RESOURCES

bubbleteasupply.com