Boba Guys

Boba Guys is a bubble milk tea retail chain headquartered in San Francisco, founded by Andrew Chau and Bin Chen. The company operates cafes selling boba (bubble) milk teas, fruit tea drinks, matcha and hojicha lattes, specialty drinks such as Hong Kong milk tea, horchata, dirty horchata, ube latte and Korean banana milk, plus espresso-based beverages. Drinks are built around a choice of tea base (including classic black, jasmine green, decaf black, rose black, Tie Guan Yin oolong and hibiscus mint) with selectable milk, sweetener and toppings such as tapioca balls, almond jelly and grass jelly. Menus are published in English and Spanish, and availability varies by location; customers can order ahead.

The company positions itself around brewing tea from loose leaves rather than powders, using organic milk from Straus Family Creamery, organic heirloom tea, and house-made syrups, purees and jellies. Its stated mission is to "bridge cultures," supported by three internally defined values covering quality, willingness to try new things, and responsible sourcing and customer service. Beyond drinks, stores have sold food items such as Hong Kong Toast and onigiri, branded merchandise featuring the company's aardvark logo, and loose-leaf tea under the Tea People brand, including in-store tea flights used for customer education. The company also operated an online shop, which as of the source capture was temporarily closed.

Founding story

The idea originated in fall 2011 when Andrew Chau and Bin Chen, then colleagues at messenger bag maker Timbuk2, bonded over ping pong and shared lunch trips to a boba shop in San Francisco's Mission District. After that shop closed, they taught themselves to make boba milk tea using online videos and visits to shops across the city. Two months later they held their first pop-up at Ken Ken Ramen, initially operating with a rice cooker out of a ramen restaurant bar, without a business plan or customer base.

Business model

Boba Guys generates revenue through company-operated retail stores selling bubble tea and other beverages, with additional sales of food items, branded merchandise and loose-leaf tea (including via an online tea store). The founders have described the business as fully independent and vertically integrated, with tea sourced directly in Asia.

Direct-to-consumer sales at retail locations and online. Reported store pricing placed milk teas at $3.50 to $5.50 in 16- and 24-oz sizes with toppings at an additional 50 cents each, pots of tea at $4.50-$5.50, and three-tea flights at $10. Tea accounted for 70-80% of profits and food items about 10%, per 2016 reporting.

Traction

As of May 2018 the company reported serving approximately 10,000 drinks per day, with about 60% of customers new according to its Square reports, which the founders translated to roughly 2 million new customers per year. It had about 100 employees as of 2016 and opened its 12th location in May 2018.

Latest developments

The company opened its first Southern California store in Culver City on May 11, 2018 after a three-week soft opening, and announced a second Los Angeles location in Historic Filipinotown for later that summer. Its online shop was listed as temporarily closed at the time of source capture.