Celestial Seasonings

What: Celestial Seasonings Tea factory tour
Where: Boulder
When: Monday - Saturday on the hour from 10 AM - 3 PM;
Sundays on the hour from 11 AM - 3 PM

In 1969, founder Mo Siegel was a 19-year-old hippie picking wild herbs with his friends to create an herb tea for the local health food store to sell. Today, over 250 employees work at this successful tea company which produces up to 9,000,000 tea bags per day!

When you step into the tea sampling room, you’ll smell a variety of herbs and spices that create the numerous teas offered by Celestial Seasonings. Enjoy your choice of samples of over 50 different varieties before beginning a tour of the facilities.

The tour begins with a short film shown in an Art Gallery that features the original paintings that were used as illustrations for Celestial Seasonings’ colorful and whimsical boxes. Their packaging is also known for including inspiring and diverse quotations, such as “By perseverance the egg walks on legs" (African proverb) or “The day shall not be up so soon as I, To try the fair adventure of tomorrow” (Shakespeare). Next comes a guided tour of the factory, which is a very busy place on weekdays, but usually idle on weekends.

The most unforgettable part of the tour is the contest to see who can stay in The Mint Room the longest. Some people will step in and dash out immediately as their eyes start to water profusely; others will relish the extremely powerful aromas of peppermint and spearmint, and will find that they can breath more clearly for days after this sinus-boggling experience.

There is a gift shop and a café (open weekdays) on site for those whose appetites for tea and a bite to eat has been whetted by aromas of mint, vanilla, ginger, mint, lavender, chamomile, hibiscus, mint, licorice root, orange peel, and (did we mention) mint.

NO PHOTOGRAPHY is allowed within the Factory, but you may take photos in the other areas, including the Art Gallery.