About

Behind Tao Tea Leaf

Founded in 2009, Tao Tea Leaf is a Toronto-based retailer and wholesaler of loose leaf teas, with a focus on Chinese teas, as well as featuring blended teas and herbs. 

Tao Wu (a certificated Tea Sommelier and second generation tea exporter) and Mingzhu Gao (a certificated Tea Sommelier who graduated from Carleton University and worked as an accountant) began this specialty tea company out of love and passion for high quality tea. Our tea has gained a lot of attention including a First Place Award in the annual North American Tea Championship. Our retail tea shop has been featured as one of the best tea shops in Toronto by blogto.com, and was also featured in the Toronto Star: <<All The Best Tea From China>>.

Tao Tea Leaf is committed to transparency in the tea industry. We source traditional, handmade teas directly from the growers and tea masters who craft them around the world. We hand blend and custom craft the finest teas and botanicals. Our collection has grown to 180 unique teas and blends; this includes our 53 certified organic selections.

We bring small groups of tea lovers to China for tea tours every year. We share who they are, what we see, how we feel not only best teas.  All our tea information is honest and accurate, as are the stories behind each tea, and our customers have come to expect a real, fully genuine experience with us.

Tea is all about sharing; Tao Tea Leaf offers in-store tea tasting events and workshops which help novice tea drinkers learn more about tea and culture. We also offer tea tasting events and workshops which, in the past, have been presented in cooperation with the Toronto Library, Harry Rosen and Park Hyatt Hotel, etc.

Tao Tea Leaf founded the first Toronto Tea Festival in 2013, and this tea festival has become an annual event. It is the largest festival of its kind in Canada, as every year more than 45 local tea related vendors participate and more than 2500 tea lovers attend. The Tea Festival is a great opportunity to explore the world of tea.

We believe that Ecommerce is the future. We were among the finalists for the 2014 Canada Post Ecommerce Innovation Awards – Most Creative Marketing Campaign (Small). We are connecting Tea Gardens to Tea Cups across the world by the click of a mouse. Today, we’ve built a company that connects tea masters across China to tea lovers in more than 15 countries, from the United States to Thailand, Germany to Greece, Turkey to the United Kingdom, Norway to Spain, Australia to the United Arab Emirates, Ireland to Indonesia, and Russia to France. Tea lovers across Canada and around the world are finding the teas they want and the information they need at Tao Tea Leaf’s website. Our teas are also selling at Staples.ca, Shop.ca, Amazon.ca and will be launched at theShoppingChannel.com soon.

We are always ready to show the truth and art of tea. We’ve got a great cup waiting for you!