About Dragonfly

Dragonfly was one of the first brands to put properly organic herbal tea on a mainstream British shelf, and it has stayed unflashy about it for over three decades. Established in England in 1988, it built its name on single-ingredient and very simple herbal infusions to Soil Association organic certification, when organic herbal tea was still a niche concern. The philosophy has never changed: a genuinely good rooibos or peppermint does not need dressing up, and if the botanical is grown well and not adulterated, the cup speaks for itself. That restraint is unusual in a category that competes on packaging and wellness claims, and it is why Dragonfly became the quiet benchmark for what single-origin organic herbal tea should taste like.

The range is the essentials done properly, pure rooibos, pure peppermint, camomile, green tea and a small set of clean blends, all certified organic, no artificial flavourings, no filler leaf. For our shelf Dragonfly is the British retail benchmark for honest single-ingredient organic herbal tea. The rooibos is the afternoon cup to drink when you want something caffeine-free that still tastes of something, and the pure peppermint outperforms flashier, pricier rivals because there is nothing in the bag but leaf. It carries less brand polish than Pukka and a deliberately narrower range, and that is the trade. What you get back is purity and consistency, a brand that has spent thirty years proving the simplest version, done properly and certified rather than merely claimed, is usually the best one on the shelf.

Key facts

• Family Tea Heritage Bruce Ginsberg's family has been in the tea and Rooibos business for over a century, with the H.L. Hall grandfather line giving Dragonfly a real estate-direct heritage in South African herbal botanicals rather than a manufactured marketing story.
• Slow Tea Philosophy Dragonfly champions the Slow Tea principle: single-ingredient or simple botanical blends, certified organic, brewed for the full recommended time rather than dunked through a mug. Quality leaf and root over flashy positioning.
• Organic Pioneers When Bruce launched Dragonfly in 1988, certified-organic herbal tea was barely a category in UK retail. Dragonfly was one of the first British brands to commit fully to Soil Association certification across every product line.
• Cotton-Stitched Bags Every Dragonfly tea bag is folded and stitched with organic cotton thread rather than sealed with plastic glue or a metal staple, making the bags genuinely home compostable straight onto the garden bed once the leaf is spent.

The founders

Brand timeline

1. 1904 Hall family pioneers Rooibos

   H.L. Hall (Bruce Ginsberg's maternal grandfather) plants one of the first commercial Rooibos estates in the Cederberg region of South Africa.

2. 1988 Bruce Ginsberg founds Dragonfly

   Bruce launches Dragonfly Tea in London, one of the first UK brands fully committed to Soil Association organic certification.

3. 2010 Slow Tea philosophy

   Dragonfly formalises its Slow Tea philosophy: single-ingredient blends, cotton-stitched bags, no plastic glue.

4. 2020 Family-owned, organic throughout

   Family-owned with direct relationships to smallholder growers across South Africa, India and China.

5. 2026 Stocked at Teas.co.uk

   Hand-picked curator selection of the full Dragonfly organic range.

Sustainability

Dragonfly is a pioneer in genuinely sustainable UK herbal tea, with organic and ethical credentials that pre-date the supermarket eco shelf by decades rather than being bolted on as a marketing afterthought. Every product is Soil Association certified organic, the tea bags are folded and stitched with cotton thread rather than sealed with plastic glue, and the cardboard outer cartons are FSC-certified from responsibly managed forests and printed with vegetable-based inks. The brand was an early participant in the World Land Trust Carbon Balanced Publication scheme and works directly with smallholder growers in South Africa, India and China rather than buying through anonymous commodity channels.

• Soil Association Organic Every ingredient across the Dragonfly range is certified organic by the Soil Association, audited annually, with full traceability back to the named grower rather than the anonymous commodity wholesaler.
• Cotton-Stitched Bags Tea bags are folded and stitched with organic cotton thread, with no plastic glue and no metal staple. Fully home compostable straight onto the garden bed once the leaf is spent.
• FSC Carton, Vegetable Inks The cardboard outer cartons are FSC-certified from responsibly managed forests and printed with vegetable-based inks rather than petroleum solvent inks, keeping the packaging genuinely recyclable.
• Carbon Balanced Packaging Dragonfly works with the World Land Trust Carbon Balanced Publication scheme to offset the printing and packaging footprint of every box by protecting threatened tropical forest acreage on the brand's behalf.