COVID-19 RESPONSE
April 1, 2020 – update: Brain Tea, Inc. and the Coronavirus (Covid-19)
Brain Tea Inc. British Columbia, Canada, and our manufacturing and warehouse partners located in Arizona and California.
After the issuance of ‘Stay-at-home’ Executive Order in an effort to mitigate the impact of COVID-19 Coronavirus. The government stated that the supply chain must continue, and as an ‘Essential Business’ providing food and beverage ingredients to other ‘Essential Businesses’, we will remain open.
Brain Tea would like to take this opportunity to extend our thoughts and warmest wishes to all our valued customers and partners as we all navigate through this unprecedented time.
As Covid-19 continues to create serious business disruptions in Canada and the USA as well as the rest of the world we need to be pragmatic and realistic about the potential for complications.
You rely on us as a source of premium quality herbal tea with a stable inventory supply just as we rely on you as a loyal customer.
OUR PLAN TO MAINTAIN OPERATIONS – All administrative members of our staff will be working from home while the remainder of our production staff has been cross-trained to assist in; order preparation, packaging, production, and shipping. Maintaining the safety of our staff while getting our premium teas to you is our top priority.
OUR HERB SUPPLY - We have large inventories in our warehouse under vacuum seal - Shipments are continuing to arrive from the farms and production centers around the world. With raw materials of herbs continuing to arrive to us, plus on-hand stocks, we have sufficient inventory to accommodate several months of our normal demand.
IMPLICATIONS – Should we need to activate our Action-Plan, you may see delays on orders of an additional 5-10 days for fulfillment times.
BRAIN TEA’S MANUFACTURING PROCEDURES AND WHY YOU ARE SAFE
- We are constantly in contact with the farms for weekly updates.
- Tea is packed at the estate and production facility into superior food grade packing materials.
- Products are palletized and containerized when shipped by sea (mechanically – no human contact)
- Product arrival to the factory is unloaded (raw materials are not opened until being used – no human contact).
- All equipment is sanitized with *food grade sanitizer (eliminates contamination @ 99.99% effectiveness) All raw material storage is vacuum packed mechanically – no human contact
AT THE TEA ESTATE - TEA DRYING All herbs are mechanically dried at temperatures above 200 degrees F (95 degrees C) for minimally 15 minutes. Some are sun dried and may undergo up to 5 minutes of mechanical drying at the above noted temperature. Reports from the W.H.O. and other health authorities indicate that the incubation period of Corona Virus is up to 14 days in a live host – (transit time of tea from the estate to our facility is 60 days thereby further eliminating the possibility of contamination). There have been NO reports that Corona Virus is able to survive in high temperatures or in products that are dried to below 4-5% moisture.
RECOMMENDED STEEPING TEMPERATURE and TIME The recommended steeping temperature of tea in water is greater than 190 degrees F (90C) for 5 minutes. (We also recommend that you bring the water to a rolling boil and allow it to cool to the desired steeping temperature).
Whilst tea is prepared to individual tastes, the longer you steep tea, the better it tastes and the higher the probability that any microorganisms in your water will die due to high temperature.
We believe that drinking tea regardless of the origin of the tea, is a safe practice. To the best of our knowledge, there are no microorganisms that can survive high temperature tea steeping; so not only is tea good for you, but with proper and recommended preparation, you also ensure that the water is free of potentially harmful microorganisms.
Note: Our *food-grade sanitizer is a plant-based compound and water-soluble…. and 99.99% effective!
Other notes:
- Teas that are flavored: The flavoring we use is ethyl alcohol based**. Ethyl alcohol is plant-based, water-soluble and a known sanitizer.
- Tea bagging machines are broken down and thoroughly micro-vacuumed and sanitized after each use which eliminates contamination at 99% effectiveness.
- Staff in our production room wear hair-nets, sterile gloves, lab coat and N95 masks when packing tea and monitoring bagging machines.
- Our manufacturing processes are virtually human contact free. Between flavoring different blends, the equipment is sanitized (eliminates contamination at 99.99% effectiveness).
- Throughout our facility, enhanced personnel sanitizing stations are standard protocol and regular staff training is undertaken to ensure compliance.
** Ethyl alcohol is the ‘carrier’ for the essential oils. How it works is the essential oils are blended into the ethyl alcohol. The essential oils breakdown into molecules creating a flavoring solution. The fluid is then applied to the blend by atomizing the flavoring. The molecules in solution with the ethyl alcohol penetrate the tea leaves. The ethyl alcohol evaporates virtually instantly. The result is that the essential oil molecules are deep within the tea leaves giving the consumer an extraordinary taste experience
The other option (which we don’t use) for a flavoring carrier is known as Propylene Glycol (PG). PG is a petroleum-based volatile compared to ethyl alcohol which is water based. We have seen that PG based flavored teas have a slight ‘chemically’ aftertaste. Understandable, as it is petroleum based. {You might be interested to know that PG is used by airports around the world to de-ice aircraft if necessary}
We have to mention that so that you’re aware of what we don’t use.
Yours Truly,
Brain Tea Team.
