Karin Müller spills the tea on how her business bagged sustainability’s most coveted certification
In a world full of greenwashing, some sustainability certifications do hold the weight of truth. Becoming a Certified B Corporation is a big deal. Galway based Solaris Tea has just become one of Ireland’s latest BCorps. Fiona Alston caught up with co-owner Karin Müller as she spills the tea on how the company bagged sustainability's most coveted certification.
If you are a tea drinker, the chances are you have tasted a cup of Solaris Tea. The brand is a popular choice among cafes, restaurants and hotels in Ireland and it is the ‘moment of pause’ for many employees of the international tech firms in Ireland. And now, it has achieved B Corp status and is set to become an international favourite for the conscious consumer.
“Because our bar was already so high, it’s kind of a recognition of what we do in an internationally recognisable way. On the international platform, it is held in quite high regard – it’s regarded as one of the most stringent certifying bodies in the realm of sustainability and governance,” says Karin Müller, creative director at Solaris Tea.
Müller met her husband Joerg while studying a science degree in herbal medicine in the UK. Both with an interest in herbal benefits and a curiosity for nature, it was written in the tea leaves that they would put their skills to good use and make a really good cup of tea.
Raised on an organic farm in Sligo, Müller spent her days roaming the landscape on her Connemara pony, equipped with a herb identifier in the back pocket, getting to know the mountains and the seascapes for the best herbs.
“My mum was a nurse, and my dad was a surgeon, so I always had that curiosity about both the science of things and also the native knowledge around herbs and how they interact in tea,” Müller tells me.
“The real aim was to connect people to plants in a pleasurable way. You can’t create healthy new habits if you’re not also enjoying it,” she explains how they made tea mainstream, and how their persistence paid off.
“People laughed at us at the time. From the beginning, we used sustainable packaging – we used whole leaf teas, which are higher in antioxidants. We stayed organic from the very beginning of our journey, and it was a slow growth. We didn’t have massive investors. We kept reinvesting the money we put in, and eventually the trend caught up with us in essence,” she shares.
Müller advises, “you have to have passion in what you do, and then you have to have a damn good business plan. There’s that reality check of allowing something to grow naturally, but it also has to meet the needs of the customer.”
Getting BCorp certified is no mean feat. Its standards ‘define social, environmental, and governance practices for purpose-driven businesses’. Just what does it take for an Irish SME to prepare for the certification?
“You can’t really grow an authentic, sustainable company if you’re not also sustainable in your work practices with your employees, or if you don’t care what’s going on in your community, and don’t at least try to see what mini baby steps you can take towards a bigger picture. And B Corp does that,” says Müller.
The process made Solaris Tea realise they had set a high standard from the offset but despite their naturally good practices getting it together for certification was no easy task.
“You have to have everything documented, and you need to be able to analyse it. Thankfully, because we are Origin Green certified and Organic Trust certified, we have a massive amount of yearly auditing, that really helped us,” she says.
“We did use a consultant for the early steps and that was really helpful. Apart from that, I suppose we were just really diligent. It did take us a year. We probably could have done it quicker if we did nothing else, but, you know, we’re working in a very busy company,” she adds.
For anyone who is thinking for going for the certification Muller has the following advice:
- Get your ducks in order before you even apply. Have you been keeping track of all your statistics over a period of time so that you can quantify them?
- Consider taking a consultant for the early stages, just to make sure that you’re really on the right track. It really helps to keep accountability and get your team on board.
- You’re not going to be able to do this on your own. We’re blessed with an amazing team. We divvied out different areas and then held each other accountable.
- Set yourself bite-sized portions that are achievable.
- Document your community efforts. We didn’t even use all our community efforts, because we hadn’t really properly tracked them, whereas we had kept track of all the sustainability things.
Already a player in international markets, Solaris Tea hopes its newest certification will open doors as it plans to grow globally. Müller herself has just moved away from her career as a midwife to work full time in the company. Now, that is someone who deserves a moment of pause and a nice cup of tea.
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