N.B. This photo is not real, it is an AI-generated one.
The Problem and Motivation Behind
“I saw a growing opportunity in high-quality tea and rural revitalisation … I’ve always been a fan of tea culture,” Yule added. “But I also saw this shift from tea being a household drink to becoming something more commercial—and that’s where I thought we could bridge the gap.” – Yule Xu.
Yule Xu (21-year-old) lives in Guangxi Province (China) —an area renowned for producing high-grade tea—has witnessed firsthand the challenges facing local tea farmers. Although tea has been a vital part of China’s cultural and economic heritage for centuries, many farmers struggle to access fair markets for their products. Much of their high-quality tea is processed and sold through large corporations, leaving them with limited profits and little connection to consumers. At the same time, traditional tea culture is fading, especially among younger generations in urban areas who are becoming increasingly disconnected from the art of tea-making and its cultural significance.
Motivated by these challenges, Yule Xu and his team wanted not only to economically support local tea farmers and open more opportunities for them to market and sell their tea. They also wanted to preserve local tea traditions and culture
The Innovative Solution
“We created a company that provides tea training services, business catering, and even public health services—combining culture with commerce.” – Yule Xu
When Yule Xu and his team joined the Youth Innovation Lab, they chose to explore how to support local tea farmers and preserve tea culture traditions. Using a Design Thinking process, they began by conducted field visits to tea-growing villages, learning about tea types and identifying the needs tea farmers.
Local tea farmers lacked the branding, processing skills, and market access to sell their harvest. They then collaborated with professors and tea industry experts to better understand the processing and branding gaps. They generated ideas on how to integrate e-commerce, live broadcasting, and cultural education to enable tea farmers to increase their sales an get better prices. They decided to register a local company, providing three main services:
- E-commerce and business services for tea farmers: Supporting local farmers in packaging, promoting and catering their tea through e-commerce platforms, corporate and university events, such as soccer matches or business forums. “We taught local farmers about tea packaging, and we used livestreams to promote their products online. It became a new model for rural commerce,” Yule Xu explained.
- Tea culture training: Conducting workshops and demonstrations in schools, communities, and events in urban communities to preserve tradition rituals of tea brewing and tasting.
- Tea Culture Share Space: Creating a space in local community that provide real cultural experiences, in which visitors and tourists can come to learn about and enjoy traditional tea culture, and buy high quality tea products.
Their business model relied on revenues from selling tea and organising tea tasting and culture education activities. Their business has been running for few months, but they have stopped as they moved to last year of their collage and got busy with finishing their studies and figuring their careers.
Lessons Learned and Addressing Challenges
Participating twice in the Youth Innovation Lab, Yule Xu used the first experience to launch the company and the second to refine its direction. Mentors support helped the team develop a clearer business plan and consider ideas like establishing a tea-sharing space for immersive cultural experiences. For Yule Xu, the journey has already created lasting change. “This project transformed how I think. I now start from reality, think step by step, and focus on the logic behind a project—not just the passion,” Yule Xu explained.
Reflecting on learning, Yule Xu identified three lessons learned:
- Brining up new team members is essential to keep the business running: As Yule Xu and his team neared graduation, they struggled to sustain the business. “All the shareholders are senior students, and now they’re studying or working elsewhere,” he explained. Without incoming students invested in the company, operations slowed.
- Mentorship and funding support is highly needed: They faced a common challenge among youth-led innovations—funding. “We gave a lot, but we didn’t see much in return. It’s hard for students to stick to something without any encouragement,” Yule Xu admitted. He believes more structured, long-term mentorship and funding mechanisms would help such initiatives flourish.
- Learning about collaboration in practice: This experience taught them how to share responsibilities, listen to each other, and build trust within a team. They realised in practice how collaboration leads to better results that working individually even it is not free of challenges “Before, I used to think I could do everything alone. Now I see that a team brings more possibilities. That’s something I truly learned from YIL,” Yule Xu admitted.
Next Steps and Future Aspirations
“If the situation allows after I graduate, I want to return to school to teach juniors how to run this company … We want to keep our connection with the farmers. We’ve built trust there, and there’s still so much we can do,” Yule said, reflecting on the relationships with farmers.
Although their business is currently discontinued, Yule Xu plans to restructure the company’s equity to include younger students, giving them ownership and motivation to continue the work. He is also to return to his village, forming new partnerships, and one day expanding into cross-border e-commerce.