Meet Isabella Tejada of Tea Drops in Downtown LA

Today we’d like to introduce you to Isabella Tejada.

Isabella, let’s start with your story. We’d love to hear how you got started and how the journey has been so far.
I grew up in Oxnard, California a big-little city about an hour outside of LA. Though a very beautiful place, I often found myself indoors and immersed into the world of literature. This influence probably came from my parents, both educators and big believers in bedtime stories. Throughout my life, I’ve always loved the concept of storytelling, not just in books and print, but also in movies and television. This followed me all the way into my college years where I graduated from Cal State Northridge (Go Matadors!) with my degree in Journalism.

After college, I took on a new form of storytelling. This time in what I like to call the storytelling of a brand… Marketing. Many job applications later, I ended up at Tea Drops, where I still tell stories aka run social, marketing campaigns, and coordinate partnerships with brands and influencers.

Overall, has it been relatively smooth? If not, what were some of the struggles along the way?
Getting into the workforce after college was not easy. I probably applied to a thousand jobs out of college before I found the right fit for me, and on the way faced a lot of internal struggles about my knowledge and abilities after dealing with rejection, let’s just say, “more than once.”

My first year at Tea Drops, I commuted 2 hours to work and 2 hours home in LA traffic. I was living, very glamorously, with my parents and would come home with just enough time to take a shower and go to bed, just to do it all again the next day. Now, a LA resident, I still don’t know how I did that everyday. Well, I guess I know, I was given a great opportunity that made it worth it in the end!

Working in a startup environment, I can truly say I’ve seen all aspects of what it takes to run a business. I learned very quickly what I liked to do and what I didn’t like to do, but it made me appreciate all of the moving parts it takes to make everything go.

Please tell us about Tea Drops.
I’m the Marketing and Partnerships Associate for a tea company based out of Downtown LA called Tea Drops. A little about us: we make organic, dissolvable loose leaf tea pressed into fun shapes (I probably say/write that line about a thousand times a day). What I’m most proud to say about Tea Drops besides the fact that our tea is not only genius but delicious, is that I work for a woman-led company. When I started two years ago, there were four of us on the team. All women. It was important to me and still is, to be surrounded by strong women who could teach me the ins and outs of business, how to navigate my career, but most importantly just serve as support along the way!

My role is a lot of work, but also a lot of fun. Though it’s easy to get caught up in a certain idea or vision for a social media post or specific marketing campaign, it’s also important to remember that there’s people on the receiving end of it and you’re doing it for them! Tea Drops has an amazing fanbase and customers, some of which have been following the brand since its very start. The best part about my job is being able to create this community for them where they can feel included on the Tea Drops journey and even relate to the brand. Whether that’s showing them behind the scenes of our daily life in the office, or posting a funny picture of a celebrity drinking tea, we’re just trying to connect. I think that as a business it’s important to maintain a relationship with the customers to learn about what draws them to the brand and where we fit into their lifestyle. We can both learn about them and learn from them.

If you had to go back in time and start over, would you have done anything differently?
If I had to start over, I would start being uncomfortable a lot sooner. Looking back, my most uncomfortable moments are where I saw the most growth in myself.

Contact Info:

• Website: https://www.myteadrop.com/
• Email: [email protected]
• Instagram: @myteadrop
• Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/MyTeadrop/
• Twitter: https://twitter.com/myteadrop
• Other: My instagram: @isabelladtejada

Image Credit:
Marti Lippert

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