Tealine: Youth-Driven Social Enterprise for Community Impact and Inclusion

Nov 13, 20243 min read

At AYLUS Pearland, youth are inspired to follow their passions while actively serving the community. A recent initiative in this spirit was the acquisition and development of Tealine, a social enterprise.

Tealine began as a small business by high school students who crafted and tested various boba tea recipes, quickly gaining popularity among their peers. In 2023, as the original founders graduated, AYLUS Pearland saw an opportunity to acquire Tealine, aiming to provide youth with practical business experience while expanding community impact. The acquisition offers students hands-on experience in areas like business operations, finance, and marketing. Additionally, as a social enterprise, Tealine now supports fundraising and skill development, particularly for individuals with special needs—an area of focus for AYLUS Pearland’s mission of inclusivity.

To facilitate this initiative, in the summer of 2023, AYLUS Pearland’s Parent Advisory Board appointed a youth team led by William Sun and Alex Sun, with guidance from AYLUS alum Andy Jiang. Their first steps included meeting with Tealine’s founders to understand all aspects of the business—operations, inventory, processes, recipes, supply management, marketing, and customer base. The team then evaluated the inventory, created a business plan, and drafted a pro forma and acquisition contract. To ensure a smooth transition, they included a bonus structure for the founders, incentivizing them to train AYLUS volunteers in boba tea preparation and sales for independent management of Tealine’s fundraising events.

Upon reaching an agreement, AYLUS hosted a ribbon-cutting event to formally announce the acquisition of Tealine. In parallel, a logo design competition was organized, drawing about 15 participants. The top designs were chosen by a committee led by Wendy Yin, featuring external partners and youth organization representatives.

After the ribbon-cutting, the founders began training volunteers in boba tea preparation. Each sale offered a discount to encourage feedback, which led to refining the recipes and finalizing three signature flavors: green tea, classic milk tea, and Thai tea.

In the summer and fall of 2023, AYLUS Pearland held two successful boba tea fundraising events, raising funds for the Achieve Together Fund to support local student clubs. The success of these events inspired AYLUS’s Frisco and Plano branch to start their own boba tea initiative, with Pearland volunteers providing hands-on training. As more youth became involved, their creativity led to a new product line, including popular items like chia seed lemonade, which sold well at the Independence Day Festival. Junior volunteers also began experimenting with different food items, such as cookies, cupcakes and onigiris, for future ventures. During the summer of 2024, they even visited a local summer camp to teach children how to make onigiris, expanding their community outreach through hands-on culinary activities.

Tealine serves not only as a platform for fundraising and youth entrepreneurship training but also as a valuable venue for work skills training for individuals with special needs. AYLUS Pearland is dedicated to fostering inclusivity within the special needs community, as demonstrated by its SMILE 4 Special Needs initiative. Through this track, AYLUS has organized various skill-building classes to support individuals with special needs in developing practical competencies. Tealine marks the beginning of AYLUS’s social enterprise efforts to further this mission, using the business as a model for inclusive employment and empowerment.

Ribbon Cutting Ceremony for Tealine Acquisition (From left to right: AYLUS Pearland Co-President Matthew Niu, Co-President William Sun, Tealine Founder, Tealine Founder Mark Wong)