Celestial Seasonings Tour: Boulder Tea Factory
If you like drinking tea, learning about it, or are curious about how it is made, the Celestial Seasonings Tour is just the thing for you.
We’ve been several times and always enjoy bringing visitors to this tour and tea tasting, since most people have at least seen Celestial Seasonings tea in the grocery store.
A visit to this Boulder Tea Factory is interesting, informative, and tasty!
DISCLAIMER: This post may contain links to affiliate websites. When you click on and/or make a purchase through an affiliate link placed on our website, we may receive a small commission or other form of compensation at no additional cost to you. Please read our disclaimer for more info.
The Celestial Seasonings Tour
Getting Ready
Getting ready to go on the tour consists of donning some stylish mandatory hair nets. If you have facial hair, as one of our friends did, you also get a beard net. Don’t be shy, rock that thing! Then you’ll receive a little introduction and background on the company.
The Factory
When they lead you into the factory itself you’ll see boxes and boxes of ingredients. You will stop by the room that contains all the tea itself. The tea is separated from other ingredients because of how absorbent it is.
An especially memorable part of the tour is the mint room. Bags and bags of peppermint are stacked in this room, and the smell is very potent. They warn that your eyes may water though I can’t say I felt that. It just was a very thick minty smell. You can of course opt out of going in this room or walk out anytime if it’s too much for you.
Finally, we made the round of the main factory floor where the tea is put into the tea bags, boxed, packaged, and wrapped.
No picture taking is allowed in the factory itself. As one of the employees put it when I inquired, “for all we know you could be from Lipton or something.”
The Tea Tasting Room
Either before the tour or when you’ve completed the tour, you can go into the tea room in the tour center and try out a huge variety of teas. It also appears that you can try the tea samples both with or without a tour.
You can sample their teas in the tasting room to your heart’s content. Seriously, there are a lot of tea varieties to try.
There’s a whole line of self-serve teas on the counter, and then you can request any of the other teas on their board as well. There are both hot and iced teas.
Drink it plainly or doctor it up with some honey and/or cream. The chai varieties were my personal favorite.
Things To Know
Location
The factory is located in Boulder, CO (4600 Sleepytime Drive, Boulder, CO 80301). This tour would be a good outing if you’re in Boulder, Golden, Denver, or any of the other surrounding areas.
Tour Times
You can take the tour on Tuesday – Saturday (10-4). They are closed Sunday and Monday. Tours depart every hour. Expect the tour to last about 45 minutes.
Costs
The Celestial Seasonings tour and tasting room cost $6 + service fees per person. I remember when it was still free, but the price now is still very reasonable. Book your Celestial Seasonings tour in advance which is required to make sure you get a spot.
Tea Shop
There is a great gift shop where you may want to buy some things. You can buy your favorite teas themselves and flavors not usually in your local grocery store, tea related merchandise, and all kinds of other home goods and gifts.
Visiting With Kids
The minimum age requirement for the tour is 5 years old. If you have a younger child one of the adults could take them to the tea room or wander around the gift shop in the meantime. There are several tours each day so you could probably take turns watching a younger child and going on the tour.
Wheelchairs and walkers are specifically listed as being allowed on the tour but not strollers. Considering kids under 5 aren’t allowed on the tour the expectation is most likely that all kids will walk.
Kids 15 and younger must be accompanied by an adult.
For kids that can go on the tour this would be a great learning experience. As a parent I always love teaching my kids how things are made and where they come from. Any time they see this tea brand in the store or drink tea at home they can remember what they learned!
With the large varieties of teas to be tasted, they may enjoy finding something they like even if they haven’t had much tea before. There are caffeine free herbal teas if you don’t want your children having any caffeine.
What To See Next
Check out the nearby Museum of Boulder. It’s also relatively low cost and has displays on the history of Boulder County and other interesting temporary exhibits as well.
Head into downtown Boulder and wander up and down Pearl Street where you’ll find all sorts of shops and restaurants.
If you’re looking for an outdoor activity, take a hike into the Boulder Flatirons where you can see them from below or hike a trail up into them for great views.
Food and drink factory tours are one of our favorite things to do, and we’ll seek out as we travel. We’ve been on brewery tours such as Guinness, Sam Adams, Budweiser, and Yuengling, the Tillamook Cheese Factory, chocolate tours, maple syrup tours, and more.
