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Tea Connexions, a specialty tea wholesaler based in Kingston, Ontario, is expanding to the United States – and possibly Europe, Australia and New Zealand, too.

"In the past, I had this dream that I could control everything, but this year I turned 40, and it's time for me to stop trying to do that," joked Sanjay Gupta, president and CEO of Tea Connexions.

Building on his established distribution network, Gupta is opening three locations in the U.S.: a headquarters in St. Louis, Mo., a Western regional office in Pomona, Calif., and an Eastern regional office in Alpharetta, Ga. Daniel Johnson will be president of the U.S. operations and based in St. Louis; Michelle Davenport will be vice president of Western U.S. Business Development; and Joseph Arnette will be vice president of Eastern U.S. Business Development. All three are customers of Tea Connexions.

Essentially, Gupta explained, he's setting up a network of licensees. "We will be be the exclusive supplier to our licensees, and they have the exclusive rights to use our name" he said. "This frees us up to focus more on marketing and training, my core competencies."

Gupta said he also had a customer in Germany who was interested in starting a European operation of Tea Connexions. "We're also eyeing Australia and New Zealand," he added.

According to Gupta, Tea Connexions differentiates itself from competitors by catering to small businesses that don't have enough capital to place the large bulk orders that some suppliers require.

"We're geared toward the little guy," he said. "Our business model is focused on people who don't need case lots. We buy the case lots and resell it to them in the quantities they need, then they can retail it. We add value by offering bonuses such as training and marketing."

The new offices will be set up so that these services can be offered regionally in the U.S.

Gupta said that, in addition to continuing to import direct from India and China, he hopes to create strategic partnerships with U.S. wholesale tea brands that prefer not to break up lots into small orders. The idea, he said, is that Tea Connexions would have enough inventory in stock to allow customers to pick and choose from several different brands, including Tea Connexions.

"So, we'll be carrying our competitors' products and helping them out by selling it to the small businesses that they don't want to deal with," he said. "We would take a small mark-up, but it would give them the ability to buy one unit at a time."