CAPITAL TEAS

Capital Teas is the vision of Manelle Martino, a “renaissance woman” who strives to spread her passion for tea wherever she goes. Manelle is the Chairman and co-founder of the company, a leading specialty tea provider based in the Washington D.C. area. You might say that tea runs in her blood – Manelle is the fifth consecutive generation of her family involved in the tea trade. Her great-great-grandfather, Francis Van Reyk, emigrated to Sri Lanka in the 1870s to be at the forefront of that... country’s rise in tea and every successive generation of her family since has been engaged in some aspect of the tea trade. Today, Capital Teas has six retail boutiques in Maryland, Washington, D.C., and northern Virginia. Three of the boutiques also have indoor tea bars for patrons to stop and enjoy tea at any time of the day. A seventh store, with a tea bar, will open at Capitol Hill on Barracks Row in April 2014 and an eighth will open in Charlottesville in the summer of 2014. Capital Teas imports, blends, and crafts more than 200 varieties of tea, with ingredients from 20 countries, so that selections in its stores are always kept seasonal, exciting, and enjoyable. And through its website, the company ships to followers in all 50 states and internationally. Recently, Capital Teas has also developed a successful and fast-growing wholesale tea line to dozens of premier restaurants and hotels in the Washington D.C. metropolitan area, continually adding to the overall Capital Teas fan base.More