Honey Bee Tea is opening 2 more St. Louis-area locations this winter

Editor's note: This article was updated at 3:45 p.m. Tuesday, Feb. 21, to add that the Brentwood location opened on Monday, Feb. 20.

After opening its first location at 429 Lafayette Center Drive in Manchester earlier this year, Honey Bee Tea will open two new locations this winter: one at 8558 Eager Road in Brentwood (on Monday, Feb. 20) and another 2039 Zumbehl Road in St. Charles. 

The first Honey Bee Tea, which had a soft opening in March, was established by husband and wife duo Hai Tang and Moon Duong. “We travel a lot and every time we travel, we drink a lot of boba tea,” said Tang. “If you go to a lot of bigger cities in the U.S., there's almost a boba tea [shop] on every block. There's so many, and here in St. Louis, there's still not too much.” While the number of boba tea spots in the area has been growing in recent years, Tang and Duong wanted to make the tea drinks more widely available, and Honey Bee Tea was born. Now, they plan to expand.

The new locations will be very similar to the original Honey Bee Tea. Some construction will be done in both buildings to match the owners are looking for. “We have to do a lot of renovations to make it more modern and contemporary to fit the values of Honey Bee Tea,” said Tang. Guests can expect the same black and yellow color scheme and similar contemporary décor featured at the Manchester location in the new shops. Tea can be had inside, though there will be some seating available outside – about eight outdoor chairs per shop. “We just want them to feel good and have a place they can go and hang out with their friends and grab a boba tea,” Tang said.

Guests at Honey Bee Tea can try many different kinds of made-from-scratch milk and fruit teas. Some of their most popular items include the Okinawa milk tea (made with a specialty Okinawa brown sugar syrup) with toasted crème brûlée top and the tiger sugar boba tea (made with crème brûlée pudding and brown sugar syrup). They have a variety of other non-tea beverages to choose from as well, like the ube taro latte and Vietnamese coffee (a dark roast coffee with sweetened condensed milk). 

If guests want more than drinks, Honey Bee Tea locations offer several desserts as well, including the popular Hong Kong waffle, which can be topped with syrups, sweetened condensed milk, boba and more. They also offer spicy Vietnamese chicken jerky seasoned with cilantro, basil and garlic, and Vietnamese spicy rice paper – one of their newer menu options. All drinks and food from the original Honey Bee Tea will be offered at the new locations.

The locations in Brentwood and St. Charles are projected to open around the same time, which was not originally intended. The Brentwood spot faced some setbacks that pushed the opening date much later than expected. “We ran into some difficulties with the city due to them having some new ordinances that they came out with,” said Tang. “We couldn't do any construction, nothing for about six weeks.” 

In contrast, planning for the St. Charles location was easier and came together relatively quickly. “We knew we had wanted to expand to St. Charles; we just didn't have the right location. So, we've been looking for quite some time,” said Tang. The perfect spot for Honey Bee Tea opened up when Lean Kitchen wanted to leave their St. Charles location. “If they want out, well, we want in.”

The goal is to open by winter, though no specific date has been set yet. “We are really shooting for the end of this year,” said Tang. “But, just in case we run into any hiccups, I would say probably the latest would be January 2023.” Updates can be found on their Facebook and Instagram.

Hai and Moon hope that these new locations will help further spread their love of boba in the St. Louis area. “It's just a joy, you know, when we see our customers come in and they take a sip of our tea and their face lightens up, it's just a real pleasure and a real joy for us to see that,” said Tang. “You can’t beat that.”