Despite the cold, iced tea fanatics are going to want to hear this Wichita news

With this week’s frigid temperatures, it may seem like an odd time to talk about iced tea. However, as tea drinkers know, it’s always the right time to talk — and drink — tea.

Just ask Michelle Albracht. She’s a former morning anchor from Amarillo who had someone on her show to discuss a business that was then called Texas Tea. Albracht fell in love with the tea and missed it desperately when she and her husband, Jacob Albracht, moved to Wichita for his job as a news and sports anchor at KWCH, Channel 12.

The tea is “my favorite thing ever,” Albracht said.

The chain now is known as HTeaO, and when Albracht heard it became a franchise, she decided to bring it to Kansas. Her first site will open this spring in Tyler Pointe at 13th and Tyler.

“And it won’t be the last in Kansas,” Albracht said.

HTeaO has 24 flavors of sweet and unsweetened tea for more than 500 drink combinations.

“There’s the endless possibility of mixing this and that,” Albracht said.

There’s a fruit bar, too, which will feature some traditional tea fruit flavorings and some unexpected ones.

Albracht said she hopes people will come into the business in order to sample what flavors they like best. There also will be a drive-through.

Albracht said part of what makes HTeaO so good is that the chain uses its own water, which has a special filtration system, for its tea and ice. It also uses broad leaf tea for its drinks, each of which is brewed on the day it’s served.

“It’s . . . the best-quality ingredients put together,” Albracht said. “Honestly, once you try it, you’re hooked, it’s so good.”

HTeaO also offers healthy snacks, bottled water, bagged ice — the small, crunchy kind that’s best known as Sonic ice — and a Yeti line.

Kameron Rich of ReeceNichols South Central Kansas and Doug Malone of ICT Capital handled the deal for the space. ICT Capital is the developer for all of Albracht’s sites. She’s not sure how many she’ll do yet, but one on the east side likely will be next.

Albracht left her television career behind when she moved to Wichita. She now has three children — plus the tea business.

“This is my next baby.”

This story was originally published February 15, 2021 at 11:12 AM.