Mike Feller & Rusty Bishop.    Gong Fu Tea got its start in September of 2003. My old college friend Rusty Bishop had just returned from participating in an extreme running event held in the Gobi Desert (The Gobi March), and I gave him a quick call to see how he had fared. That "quick call" turned into a lengthy, introspective conversation in which we both determined that we were ready to embark on a venture that would be truly inspirational. At the time, we were both coffee-swilling components of the corporate machine, and looking to completely reinvent ourselves. Tea was the vehicle that we used to accomplish that feat on nearly every level.

My experience with tea began when I was child. My parents weren't coffee drinkers at the time, so we always had tea as our hot beverage of choice. I got away from tea about the same time I started attending college. I became a coffee drinker, and continued the habit for nearly fifteen years before I finally isolated it as something which had a negative affect on my energy level. I stopped drinking coffee "cold turkey" and replaced it with common bagged teas – and felt much better as a result. My interest in tea was immediately reinvigorated at that point.

Gong Fu Tea logo.