Interesting one-liner at the end of the article:

“Shares plummeted more than 20 per cent Wednesday morning to $13.35. “

I’m sure Teavana is going to be around for a long time, but their stock performance since the IPO has been pretty uninspiring. Is this a reflection of them as a company, or is something else at work here?

There are a couple of interesting facts to pull from that article “The company said that it earned $3.5 million for the quarter that ended April 29, up from $3.3 million a year earlier.” Only a $200,000 increase despite the fact that they opened 23 new stores throughout 2011?

The article mentions same-store sales, but doesn’t give any figures about it. That would be some interesting information, because one of the things that I feel Teavana fails at is attracting people who treat tea like a commodity and drink it every day. I’ve been to our local Teavana once or twice, but it just doesn’t appeal to me. Too much out of the way  (drive to big mall downtown, park the car in the garage, walk through the mall to the store) to do on a regular basis to get some tea – forget about how expensive it is. Their website doesn’t make up for the inconvenience either, because even there, the prices are high.

The company is still marketed to a certain demographic, the new tea drinker, which no one in my household is, however, we drink copious amounts of tea. When Teavana figures out a way to attract and keep people like us, then, I think, they will be on the way to improving those numbers that analysts seems to like so much.

Perhaps they are facing the same problems as Starbucks did (sales cannibalisation, best places already taken…)