Kanan Devan Hills Plantations / Ripple Tea

Ripple Tea is the retail brand of Kanan Devan Hills Plantations (KDHP), the company that today farms the tea gardens around Munnar whose history runs back to 1880, when the first tea bushes were planted in the hills, and to 1886, when the Kanan Devan Hills Produce Company was formally established to run them. Ownership changed hands in April 2005, when Tata Tea transferred its Munnar plantations into a new company, KDHP, structured with substantial employee ownership - a structural detail that separates it from a conventional corporate estate. KDHP launched Ripple Tea as its own consumer-facing brand in 2010, selling high-grown black and green teas alongside specialty, iced and flavoured styles such as masala and elaichi-infused black tea, and broadened into e-commerce in 2015 to reach buyers beyond Kerala. The brand's range extends past tea into coffee, Kundaly Naturals essential oils, Parisudh incense sticks and handmade chocolates, all shipped direct from Munnar. On the ground, Ripple Tea connects to KDHP House and the KDHP Tea Museum, established in April 2004 as the first tea museum in India (also known as the Tata Tea Museum, on the former Nullathanni Estate), giving visitors a direct route from the plantation's 19th-century origins to the tea they can buy in the gift shop on the way out.