Is it possible to grow Ivan tea on an industrial scale?

26 august 2015

The Platonov family left the bustling metropolis for a quiet family estate - to live in harmony with nature and produce an environmentally friendly drink

IT tools used by the Platonov family

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Alexander and Dariya Platonov moved from Moscow to the Tula region a few years ago to live in the family estate. The collection and production of willow tea has become for them both a "matter for the soul" and a family business, while at the same time as unlike city work as possible. Now the family supplies tea to restaurants in Moscow and the Tula region, is considering the possibility of opening an online store, and plans to expand production.

Dossier

Alexander Platonov studied at the Faculty of Psychology of Moscow State University. In the early 90s, when he had to feed his family, he mastered the profession of a plumber. After moving to the estate, he began to look for alternative earnings, and the preparation of Ivan tea became one of the options. Daria Platonova graduated from the Faculty of Psychology of Moscow State University. After graduation, she opened her own business related to the early development of children (after moving to the Tula region, the case was closed). Now she works as an early development teacher in a children's club in Moscow, coming to the capital for 2-3 days a week and giving private lessons. All the rest of the time he spends in the ancestral settlement. In the warm season, Alexander, Daria and their three sons are engaged in the collection and production of Ivan tea

How did the idea of ​​a family business come about?
The Platonov family began to develop land in the Tula region in 2003, and in 2006 moved to the family estate for permanent residence. We decided to eat as much as possible wholesome, healthy foods. Having learned about the healing properties of Ivan tea, Daria and Alexander tried it somehow. “At first he didn't impress us in any way: grass is grass. But, as it turned out, the question was how to cook it. Once, when we were visiting, we were treated to Ivan-tea. And we were struck to the core of how tasty and unusual it was, ”recalls Dariya Platonova.

Daria and Alexander became interested in Ivan tea. It turned out that this drink has many useful properties, for example, strengthening the immune system and hair, eliminating pain in migraines, lowering body temperature, and others. This was one of the reasons why the couple began to collect and prepare Ivan tea for their family.

It took several years to collect information about this drink, search for old recipes and reveal the taste of herbal tea. Daria studied special literature, found information on the Internet, wrote down the recipes for teas, which were brought by familiar pilgrims from their travels to monasteries. “We collected the information we needed bit by bit,” she recalls.

“If there had not been such a strong positive reaction to our tea from relatives and friends, we would not have been doing this“ for sale ”

The Platonovs collected tea for themselves, and also treated their friends and relatives to it. The results delighted everyone, including the connoisseurs of this drink. Even those who also collected tea “for themselves” admired their product and recommended “expand”. “If there had not been such a strong positive reaction to our tea from relatives and friends, we would not have been doing this“ for sale, ”says Daria.

Dariya and Alexander began to sell Ivan tea in 2012. The first clients were friends and their acquaintances who asked to sell them this or that collection of plants.

At the same time, the Platonovs began to study ivan tea drinks from competitors in order to understand whether their own products corresponded to similar products on the market. The conclusions that were made after purchases from various manufacturers turned out to be ambiguous. “Some manufacturers make a good quality product, they revive old recipes. But at the same time, many suppliers have appeared on the market whose quality of tea does not stand up to criticism. Their “work” can be called discrediting the product and devaluing the very idea of ​​healthy eating, ”says Daria. She and her family relies on healthy and high-quality tea, collected and processed by hand.

How ivan tea is made
Making Ivan tea is a rather complicated technological process. Tea prepared by the Platonov family goes through six to eight processing stages.

The first stage is the collection itself. The Platonovs collect wild plants near the ancestral settlement, on the border of the Tula and Moscow regions, next to the Prioksko-Terrasny nature reserve. This is an ecologically clean place where willow tea grows in natural conditions, and is not specially planted by humans. There it coexists with other plants, which is very important for the taste of the finished product. The collection takes place in strictly defined terms - during flowering (June-July). This is a fairly short period, about a month. At this time, there is a lot of work, and you have to work 16-18 hours a day. If the weather permits, then the Platonovs go to the gathering early in the morning, as soon as the dew melts - at 3-4 o'clock.

The collected leaves are then dried to remove excess moisture. After that comes a bulkhead, as a result of which the future tea is manually freed from foreign plants and insects, which are also very fond of willow tea. “The process of careful manual bulkheading is very laborious and time-consuming, but without it there is no way to get a high-quality drink,” says Dariya Platonova.

“Experts say that our tea has amazing energy. Of course, this is the result of the handicraft and love with which we make tea. The machine will never give that result. It will be tasty too, but this is completely different. "

Further, the plants are crumpled (also by hands), and are placed on fermentation. Then the sheet is cut, dried and sieved into different fractions. The finished tea is blended (flowers or other plants are added) and laid for ripening. One batch of tea goes through all these stages for about a week. Ivan tea is packed just before the sale.

All the work of the Platonovs is manual, they do not use any industrial equipment. Although it exists and is able to facilitate the production process. Due to its cost, the equipment is not yet available to a family whose business is still in its infancy and is seasonal. For example, a machine for rolling a tea leaf costs from 200 thousand rubles.

“Experts say that our tea has amazing energy. Of course, this is the result of the handicraft and love with which we make tea. The machine will never give such a result. It will be tasty too, but this is completely different. Handicraft is handicraft. Many will understand what I am talking about. "

The family plans to purchase a leaf-rolling machine to increase production, but the assortment will definitely include handmade tea.

Project economics
When the Platonovs began to produce tea for sale, they spent about 100 thousand rubles on opening their own business, some of which were borrowed. Product certification alone cost about 30 thousand rubles. But now all tea from the Platonovs has a certificate of conformity. The rest of the money went to the manufacture of a drying cabinet, trays for drying sheets, branded packaging and labels.

The drawing for the label was presented to the Platonovs by a familiar artist. I came to visit them and, having tasted the drink, drew a sketch.Now this drawing is on all natural paper bags in which tea is packaged. “When buying from us, you can open any package, look, smell - in a word, feel the product with all your senses in order to understand what you are buying. For stores, our packaging may not be the best option. But we are ready to change in this respect, to look for something new, ”explains Daria.

The weight of one package is 60 or 100 grams. Since tea from Platonovs is hand-rolled, it takes up a lot of space when dried. Therefore, one package does not fit more than 100 grams. If the tea is tamped into a bag, the product may lose some of its properties: the leaves will crumble or wrinkle. The cost of packaging is 400-500 rubles, depending on the variety.

In total, the Platonovs' assortment includes eight different varieties of tea. This year, at the request of customers, new items have appeared. These are mixtures of willow tea with other plants: meadowsweet, which gives almond flavor, currant leaves, cherries or mint. There are both milder and more astringent fruit flavors. “The variety of assortments is incredibly important. We are constantly open to new recipes, ideas and experiments. But on the other hand, if people like this or that taste, they often ask for it the next time. Therefore, it is very important to "withstand" certain varieties, i.e. produce them from batch to batch of the same taste, "- says Dariya.

The Platonovs supply their products to two Moscow restaurants, as well as to the first Russian restaurant operating exclusively on local products - Mark and Lev in the Tula region. “We love this restaurant very much. Well done guys! Great idea and great execution. "

The Platonovs actively participate in fairs and festivals, which are now the main channel for promotion. There, in addition to selling them, they arrange tastings of their teas. The Platonovs also collaborate with organizers of ethno-festivals and events dedicated to a healthy lifestyle.

Plans and prospects
The family does not have a stationary store. there are no large volumes of sales. “Unfortunately, it is simply impossible to increase the volume to“ store ”without losing the quality of the product, we have already understood this. Maybe this is maximalism, but I do not know of other ways to make a product tasty and of high quality. We are capable of producing, at best, several hundred kilograms of tea per season. This is not a volume for Moscow, ”says Daria.

“Now our task is to cooperate with several other restaurants in Moscow or the region. I think that a restaurant with really high quality food must have traditional Russian Ivan tea in its tea list. In addition, our tea can be brewed several times - this is also a plus for the restaurant's customers. Our production volumes allow us to work on order for several restaurants: when there is a pre-order from a restaurant in terms of volume and assortment, it is much easier to plan production. Next year we plan to hire people to gather, but we will prepare tea ourselves, ”the Platonovs share their plans for the future.

Also, the Platonov family sees their task as creating an online store through which it will be possible to order Ivan tea. “But the problem is that we are far from Internet technologies, and for us this is a rather difficult goal,” admits Daria. Her children, more confident computer users, are now working on creating their own website and social media pages.

The business dream of the Platonov family is to put their product on the tables of all lovers of healthy and tasty food. “Compared to store tea, our tea is like strawberries from the garden versus strawberries from retail chains. Our whole family and our friends have already switched to our own Ivan tea and do not drink anything else, ”says Daria.

Since ancient times, Ivan tea has been used as an alternative to Indian tea. And today, when the market has increased interest in natural products, the production of Ivan-tea is receiving a new wave of revival.

The scientific name of Ivan-tea is narrow-leaved fireweed.This is a perennial herb that has a narrow leaf, thick rhizome and a long, up to 40 cm, cluster of inflorescences. It grows up to one and a half meters in height, and in one place it can grow up to eight years. Propagated by rhizomes and seeds, which can produce up to several thousand per flowering. By the way, its flowers are excellent honey plants, so the production of Ivan-tea can complement the business of producing honey.

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Why Ivan-tea

The plant has excellent taste, aroma and color when brewed. In addition, it combines well with other medicinal plants such as oregano, chamomile, mint. Therefore, the production of Ivan-tea is a good alternative to imported flavored counterparts. Especially when you consider that the plant tolerates any experiments with it well, while maintaining its healing properties. Some manufacturers were able to bring out up to 15 different varieties of finished products based on Ivan tea.

The medicinal properties of the plant have been known for a long time. Many years ago, it was harvested in about the same way as it is now - through fermentation technology. It was believed that tea can cure almost all diseases. Today it has been proven that the plant contains very valuable vitamins and trace elements, and at the same time does not contain caffeine, which ordinary teas can boast of. The drink from this plant not only soothes, tones, but also relieves headaches, scar ulcers and even helps to treat cancer. The advantage of tea is that it is not a drug and can be drunk all the time.

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Features of the organization of production

How to organize a business depends on your capabilities and investment. The plant grows freely in the wild, so it can be harvested by hand and harvested with improvised means. For a day, one person with a certain skill can collect about 30 kg of Ivan tea. This will not require any capital investments, but the production volumes will be negligible, and you can hardly build a serious business on them.

You can organize the purchase of raw materials, and you yourself will be engaged in its subsequent processing: drying and fermentation. The only problem is that there are no wholesale suppliers of raw materials; you will have to hire pickers or announce purchases in nearby villages. However, in this case there is no guarantee that the leaves will be harvested in accordance with the requirements of the production technology. It is necessary to collect it during flowering only in the morning, when there is no dew on the leaves. There is no way for the population to follow the assembly during purchases, and this factor affects the taste of tea and its medicinal properties.

Therefore, many include in the business plan the organization of a full production cycle, that is, the acquisition of land for planting a plant, sowing and growing, self-collection and fermentation. So you can get guaranteed quality raw materials and avoid the cost of purchasing them. Although some experts consider this approach economically unjustified.

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Ivan-tea making technology

Ivan-tea production begins with the collection of leaves. Harvesting time - from late June to early August, depending on the climatic conditions of the region where the business is organized. The leaves are collected in bags and immediately put into processing, since when folded they can darken and lose the desired properties.

The technology for making Ivan tea is not much different from the technology for the production of any other tea leaf. If desired, you can also produce various varieties: with or without the addition of other herbs, various types of fermentation, etc.

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Stages of Ivan-tea production

1. Preparation of leaves. They are sorted out, separating debris, washed, dried in a shaded place.
2. After the preparation of the raw material, the process of its withering begins. To do this, it is placed in a dark place where the sun's rays do not fall, and left for about a day. Dryers are used to shorten this time. After a slight loss of moisture, the sheet becomes more elastic.
3. Then comes the twisting stage. During processing, the leaves give juice. This allows the tea polyphenyls to mix with enzymes. For small home production, this is done by hand. For large volumes, a meat grinder is used, which makes it possible to obtain granulated tea. But with manual processing during brewing, the tea leaf gives sourness, a more astringent drink is obtained.
4. Fermentation. One of the most crucial stages, on which the type of tea depends, its taste and medicinal properties. The rolled or ground sheet is laid in a dark and cool room on aluminum sheets or wooden pallets. During this process, oxalic acid is destroyed inside the leaf, and the contained useful substances are activated. When using special equipment, you can set it up for full or partial fermentation. If you do this manually, you need to constantly monitor the process in order to stop it in time.
5. Drying. This step takes 20 minutes to two hours, depending on the method used. The fermented leaf is dried in ovens or in special drying cabinets with an inflow of hot air on lattice trays. Upon completion of this process, a tea with a moisture content of 2-5% black is obtained.
6. Tracking is necessary with raw materials in order to gain a characteristic aroma and acquire a typical tea shade.
7. Fractionation. This process is carried out when large production volumes are established. Large tea is packaged in packages, and small tea is used to make tea bags.

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Possible product range

Experts recommend making a regular tea at the initial stage. So, a novice entrepreneur can thoroughly master the basic production technology. You can then incorporate product line expansion into your business plan. First of all, you can diversify it thanks to various natural additives. As mentioned, you can use other aromatic plants such as mint, chamomile, currant leaves, lemongrass, oregano, and others. In addition, various dried berries are used as additives.

But you can expand the range not only with additives. It is possible to use various methods of fermentation of raw materials, which give completely different types of tea. So, the following teas are distinguished:

• Poorly fermented, the so-called green, yellow, white.
• Semi-fermented teas are blue, purple, red teas.
• Fermented - classic black.
• Over-fermented - rare and expensive pu-erhs.

All these fermentation methods give Ivan-tea special taste and aroma features.

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Paperwork

Only after deciding on the type of production and thoroughly mastering the technology, it is recommended to include the official registration of the business in the business plan. The fact is that it is desirable to enter the market with a high-quality product, therefore it is recommended to first acquire some production experience. At the initial stage, when you will prepare tea for yourself, relatives, acquaintances on the basis of a personal subsidiary farm, official registration is not required. The law allows for the possibility of selling surplus production without paying taxes.

But as soon as you decide to take your production to another level, you need to include official registration in your business plan.At least for the fact that for the implementation of the product you will need its certification. Without accompanying documentation, your tea will not be accepted for sale in any store. To do this, it is necessary to obtain a special permit from Rospotrebnadzor for this type of activity, as well as to certify each batch of goods. The same body approves the technical conditions of production and its recipe. Over time, you can arrange a product line as a dietary supplement and sell it to pharmacies and sanatoriums.

However, even before that, it is necessary to register your activity with the tax office. You can dwell on such an organizational and legal form as an individual entrepreneur. This will help avoid unnecessary paperwork. But if you are organizing a large-scale production, it is better to register an LLC. In this case, it is also recommended to create and register your own brand by developing a unique label design with the company logo.

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Staff

Whether or not you need staff depends on what type of enterprise your business plan implies. If you organize a business as a personal subsidiary farm, then you will not need personnel - all production is serviced by your family.

If you have significant production volumes that are serviced by special equipment, you will need hired personnel. First of all, tea leaf collectors. They are paid about 800 rubles. per day at a collection rate of six bags. Operators will also be required to service the equipment. The equipment is mostly automated and easy to operate, so there is no need to look for highly qualified workers.

Qualified labor will be required from an engineer who will control the order of work in general and machine tools in particular. It is advisable to have your own electrician and locksmith for the repair of production lines. If the production is small, these specialists can not be hired, but use their services as needed. The most responsible will be the search for a technologist who must develop varieties of tea and control the technology of their production. There is no official training for tea production specialists in the country, so we need to look for a person who has worked in this direction for several years.

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Equipment

As already noted, if you are planning a large-scale production, the business plan should provide for the purchase of special equipment. In specialized companies, it is necessary to purchase the following main production units:

• blending drum;
• rollers for tea;
• drying oven;
• equipment for packing.

It is rather difficult to find this equipment because it is not manufactured in Russia. And all because tea is not made on the territory of the country. Maximum - raw materials are imported and packaged. Therefore, equipment will have to be purchased from foreign manufacturers.

You can optimize the cost plan and save on the purchase if you buy the devices not individually, but as a whole production line. It will cost from 800 thousand rubles, depending on the configuration, degree of automation and power. up to 2 million rubles. It will consist of the following installations:

• device for cutting leaves,
• drying machine,
• rollers,
• tea lump breaker,
• fermentation machine,
• automatic dryer,
• bake,
• packing and filling machine.

In addition, if you plan to make tea bags, you need to purchase a separate unit.

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Production costs

As already noted, if you organize a small business, you can do without investments at all. For serious production, at least 80 thousand rubles should be allocated for the purchase of equipment. In addition, it is necessary to include another 100 thousand rubles in the expenditure plan. for certification, registration, purchase of tools, packaging, labels. The larger the production, the more staff will be needed, and accordingly, the payroll plan will increase.

Products are usually packaged in one-hundred-gram packages.The cost of each depends on the way the tea is fermented and the additives used. On average, Ivan tea is sold at a price of 800 to 1,300 rubles. per kilogram. This is about 40-60% more than its real cost. Accordingly, the business profitability is kept at the level of 50-100%.

It is believed that a business payback plan can be set for about a year. But it must be borne in mind that the business is seasonal in nature - the collection of raw materials can be carried out only in June-August. Therefore, for year-round production, it is necessary to procure a sufficient amount of raw materials and think over the technology of its production. Accordingly, you need to take care of the storage space. This is the only way to offer a quality product to the market.

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Promotion of products on the market

The market demonstrates a high demand for such a product, but in order to establish wide distribution channels for tea, it is necessary to work well on the marketing policy. You should start with small shops and private shops. And only when the product conquers its consumer, it is possible to move to large retail chains. Over time, it is worth opening your own shop.

Potential distribution channels are pharmacies, vitamin stores, sanatoriums, restaurants and other catering establishments. But it is possible to develop these directions only when all the documentation for the products is completed. Another reliable distribution channel is the Internet. You can sell tea through message boards or your own online store, if the range of products allows. Also keep an eye out for all sorts of thematic fairs, festivals, tastings and Ivan tea retail.

Narrow-leaved fireweed, popularly called Ivan-tea, is a unique plant, the beneficial properties of which are taken care of by nature itself. It is rich in B vitamins, ascorbic acid, iron, calcium, potassium, bioflavonoids and tannins.

The drink made from the leaves of this plant has anti-inflammatory and analgesic properties, normalizes sleep and tones the body. In addition, fireweed does not contain caffeine, therefore it is considered an excellent alternative to Indian tea, to which it is in no way inferior in taste. Given the growing consumer demand for natural products, the production of ivan tea can be viewed as a relevant business. In this article, we'll show you how to organize it.

Content:

• Ways to make money
• Technological process
• Equipment and personnel
• Documentation
• Implementation
• Potential profit
• Conclusion

How to make money on the production of Ivan tea

Fireweed grows freely in the wild. Its most common habitat is the coniferous forests of the European part and Siberia. The plant can be found on dry sandstones, in clearings and forest edges, near crops and near water. Its interesting feature is that it is the first to populate forest and field areas after fires.

Given the wide distribution of willow-herb in nature, you can collect it by hand yourself, harvest it using improvised means and sell it in small batches. With a certain skill, a picker can harvest about 20-25 kg of tea leaves in one day. However, these are too small volumes to talk about serious profits.

Another option is to buy raw materials from villagers and villages by prior arrangement, then independently process and sell them. But there are also disadvantages here: the lack of control over the collection of leaves can lead to a violation of the technology, as a result of which the raw material will lose its useful properties and taste.

The best option is to grow Ivan tea as a business on a plot of land (own or leased) with subsequent processing and sale. Only by organizing a full-cycle enterprise, you can get high-quality products in large enough volumes that will provide a high income.

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Production technology

Fireweed propagates both by seeds and vegetatively. Seeds are collected in September. Each stem is capable of producing 20,000 to 40,000 seeds. Seeds are planted in grooves no more than 1.5 cm deep, sprinkled with earth and watered from a watering can. The optimal distance between rows is from 60 to 90 cm. After germination, the plants are thinned out, leaving 1-2 stems every 30 cm.

Saplings are planted in the ground in early fall or spring. With proper care, timely watering, they quickly build up their vegetative mass. Ivan tea is an extremely unpretentious herb. Watering seedlings and seedlings is recommended abundantly only for the first 1-1.5 months. During this period, it is advisable to do this through a watering can or a fine sieve so as not to damage the stems. When plants reach 10-12 cm in height, they can be watered less often - only once a week.

The flowering period of Ivan tea is from late June to mid-August. Just at this time, it is necessary to collect the leaves. This should be done in the morning, when there is no dew on the plants. The leaves are collected in bags and immediately sent for processing.

Interesting! Fireweed is considered an excellent honey plant (from 1 hectare of thickets of this herb you can get 400-500 kg of honey), so the production of tea from this plant can supplement beekeeping business.

Further processing of the collected raw materials takes place in several stages:

• preparation - at this stage it needs to be sorted out, separated from debris, washed and dried;
• withering of leaves in dark rooms or in special dryers;
• fragmentation - leaves undergo special mechanical processing and sap, as a result of which important chemical processes occur;
• fermentation - the resulting mass is laid out on metal or wooden surfaces and left for a while;
• drying in ovens or drying ovens;
• thermal aging - the product is allowed to rest in order to obtain a characteristic aroma and a typical tea shade;
• packing and packaging.

The type of tea will depend mainly on the length of fermentation of the tea leaf. The most popular varieties are fermented (classic black) and low-fermented (green). In addition to the fireweed itself, you can include other aromatic plants in the tea, for example, mint, oregano, lemongrass.

If you consider Ivan tea as a small home business on the territory of your personal subsidiary farm, and the volume of your production will be low, then you can carry out all the basic operations for processing raw materials manually. If you plan to organize a full-fledged enterprise, then you will have to spend money on special equipment.

Equipment and workers

The set of special equipment will consist of the following main components:

• tea leaf cutting machine;
• withering drum;
• roller for twisting;
• fermenter;
• drying unit;
• machine for filling and packaging.

It is better to purchase everything you need from one manufacturer. A good option is to buy a ready-made production line. The price of the issue will be from 800,000 rubles. up to 2,000,000 rubles. depending on the configuration and performance of the equipment.

To work on the plantation during the tea harvest season, you will need several picking staff. The production itself presupposes the presence of several workers on the line, as well as a qualified technologist who will develop varieties of tea and control the process of its production. It is advisable to have your own equipment maintenance specialist, driver-forwarder, sales manager on staff.

Registration of activities and declaration of products

The production and sale of herbal tea in small quantities from raw materials grown on our own site does not require official registration of entrepreneurial activity. The law allows the sale of surplus products from personal subsidiary plots without paying taxes.

In all other cases, it is worth contacting the tax service to obtain the status of an individual entrepreneur (IE) or legal entity. The code of the type of economic activity according to OKVED, under which this business falls - 10.83 - "Production of tea and coffee". Do not forget to indicate it when filling out an application for registration of a legal entity or individual entrepreneur.

In addition to the completed application, a number of other documents must be submitted to the tax office. Read what documents are needed to open an individual entrepreneur. Actual package for 2017.

If you need to register a limited liability company, study the documents required to register a legal entity.

Based on the results of consideration of the application, the employees of the service make a decision and issue a certificate of state registration no later than five working days from the date of application.

The next mandatory step is to obtain a declaration for the manufactured products. Its quality and compliance with the standard (Technical Regulations of the Customs Union "On Food Safety") can be confirmed with the help of an accredited certification center. Without a declaration, your goods will not be accepted to any store, so you should not ignore this requirement. If you wish, you can also issue a voluntary certificate, which will serve as an additional confirmation of the high quality of your tea products.

Sales organization

It is difficult for a new manufacturer to immediately enter into large contracts, therefore, the introduction of goods on the market should be started gradually from small retail outlets and private shops. Follow the fairs, exhibitions of natural food in your city and be sure to take part in them. You can also offer herbal teas for sale in pharmacies and sanatoriums. Over time, when the product gains trust, it is recommended to move to large retail chains or open your own branded store.

A great way to attract consumers' attention to your product and drive sales is to create an online store and advertise on the Internet. Don't miss out on the opportunities that online commerce offers, as for most entrepreneurs who manufacture these types of products, online sales are the main source of income.

Read on how to create your own online store and what types of advertising are best to use.

Find out if farming is profitable and what ideas in this area are considered promising.

Agribusiness subsidies can be used to purchase expensive production equipment.

Profit forecast

The average retail price for Ivan tea is 250 rubles. per 100 g, the wholesale price varies from 150 to 200 rubles. At the same time, the cost of a one-hundred-gram package does not exceed 100 rubles. This amount includes the costs of growing and processing raw materials, labor costs, taxes, packaging price, depreciation of equipment, etc.

If your company produces about 500 kg of finished products per year, then the possible net profit will be from 250,000 to 750,000 rubles. depending on the implementation method.

An important feature is that the business is seasonal. Collection and procurement of tea leaves can be carried out only for 1.5-2 months a year. Therefore, in order to provide yourself with a profit throughout the year, you need to correctly calculate the volume of production and take care of the storage and storage of raw materials.

conclusions

As you can see, you can make money on Ivan tea in different ways. It can be not only a modest home business that brings additional income to the family, but also a small manufacturing enterprise with hundreds of thousands of rubles in annual profit. Prospects for the development of such a business consist in expanding the assortment line and registering manufactured goods as dietary supplements with subsequent entry into new markets.

Ivan tea, also known as Koporsky tea or fireweed, is a wonderful plant from which a healthy and tasty drink is prepared. How does it grow in nature and is it possible to grow Ivan tea with your own hands?

Reproduction in nature

Fireweed can be found in different parts of Russia, while the plant loves soils with high mineralization and a minimum of fertile layer. For example, willow tea is often the first to grow in an area where there was a peat or forest fire, thereby increasing fertility and being a kind of soil healer. So the fireweed allows other plants to grow, after which the willow tea most often dies out.

Ivan tea heals not only a person, but also nature itself, restoring the soil after fires

In nature, the plant propagates by seed. The seedlings of Ivan tea are small and attach to the parachute fluffs. They are unusually light, so they are able to travel long distances in the wind. One plant produces up to thirty thousand such seed parachutes.

When the achene gets into a favorable place, it gives rise to the growth of a new plant. Subsequently, reproduction occurs not only by seeds - the roots of ivan tea, growing, form large thickets of new plants. Within 5-10 years, willow tea grows in one place, and its dead shoots begin to form fertile soil in which other plants settle and gradually displace fireweed.

DIY growing

If you want to grow Ivan tea in the garden or in the garden plot, it is important to take into account the following points:

1. Plant seedlings cannot stand competition with other plant species.
2. Fireweed is very picky about lighting - the plant needs a lot of sunlight.
3. Ivan tea also needs highly mineralized soil.
4. Planting is possible in spring, but it is preferable to plant fireweed in autumn.
5. You can either sow willow tea seeds or plant the roots of the plant.

Sowing with seeds

When you are going to plant willow-tea seeds, you have to take some tricks so that light fluffs do not scatter far from your site. For planting, the seeds should be attached to strips of paper (it is optimal to take toilet paper, but you can also use a newspaper) one or two centimeters wide.

The down of willow tea is its seeds, with the help of them fireweed propagates in the wild Preparation

After spreading the cut paper on the table, grease it with starch or flour paste, and then use tweezers to attach fireweed seeds to the greased places. When the paste is dry, the strips of paper can be rolled up and secured with an elastic band. It is recommended to do such harvesting of seeds in winter. This is a rather laborious method. For those who want to make the planting process faster, we recommend mixing the fireweed fluff with wet sand.

Choosing a place

Next, choose a landing site. The ideal option would be a portion of the plot that was previously used for growing potatoes, as the land must be depleted. In addition, the place should be well lit by the sun. As for moisture, the site for willow tea should not be too damp or too dry. It is good if there is a small reservoir nearby so that the plant receives a lot of moisture at night.

We clear the soil from grass

Before planting, it is better to treat the soil with special means to clear the soil of grass.

A more extreme method can be used: in the place where the willow-tea will grow, we make a fire before planting, the ivan-tea is the first to grow after the fires. This should be done only on a calm day. You can burn tree branches, old planks, fence and other wood materials. After leveling the resulting coals with a rake, pour sawdust, moss or peat on top - when this layer burns out, you get more ash. The fire will help burn the roots and seeds of other plants so that in the first year the fireweed seedlings have no competitors.

The bonfire will clear the soil from competitors for fireweed and create conditions favorable for its germination

The next day, on the site, you need to make furrows up to 3 cm deep (we leave 8-10 cm between the furrows), in which to put paper with seeds. Cover everything on top with ash and sand, taken in equal proportions. Use melt water or rainwater to water the seeds. Water the seedlings abundantly, and then keep the soil moist for the first week.

If you don't feel like using paper, you can wet the seeds and mix with sand, then sow in the furrows.

The fireweed sown in April will give seedlings in mid-May, which need to be watered in dry weather. The plant will begin to bloom in 2 years, and will completely fill the site in 3-4 years after planting.

Reproduction by roots

The roots of the fireweed are large, so they are divided into parts from 5 to 10 cm long.

After dividing them into parts, they are planted in the ground to a depth of about 10 cm.Like seeds, the roots are planted in rows to make it easier to remove weeds from the site, as well as to mulch the site when sprouts appear (for this, mowed grass or straw is used, laid out in a layer of 10 cm).

Preparing the soil does not need to be as thorough as when propagating by seeds. The soil should be loosened, and ash should be used to fertilize it. The roots can be dug up in the fall (this is more convenient) or in the spring. With such vegetative propagation, the site will be completely filled with Ivan tea in 2-3 years.