I have always loved the ritual of holding a wine glass. But in 2010, I started to notice that the rosé I was drinking every night no longer served me the way it once did. The frequent headaches and restless sleep were simply not worth it and I knew it was time to make a change.
After complaining to friends about my newfound distaste for wine, I learned that many of them had turned to tequila for similar reasons. They assured me that it wouldn't have the same side effects as a glass of wine, despite how radical drinking tequila on a typical Tuesday night sounded to me at the time. I decided to give it a try. I started taste testing different white tequilas to find one that worked for me, but they were all too punchy. I spend a lot of time making complex cocktails, but that doesn't fit my lifestyle either. I needed something simple and fun.
I'm not a bartender, but I do enjoy cooking, so I decided to try infusing white tequila to see if that would help. I grabbed my Brita filter, removed the filtration system, poured the white tequila into the pitcher, and then added some fresh fruit like oranges and grapefruit, which I knew would pair well with the wine. I also like spice, so I sliced some English cucumbers and jalapenos into thin slices to add extra flavor, making sure to remove the jalapeno seeds before tossing them into the mix. I put Brita in the refrigerator and the waiting game for the infusion began.
About a day later, I stuck my finger into Brita and tasted it. Not spicy enough. I did this a few more times over the course of two days until the mixture tasted a little too spicy. I removed the jalapeños and let the cucumbers sit longer to remove the heat. After two days of waiting, I dipped my fingers in the water again and thought, "Wow, this is really different from anything I've ever tried." It had a hint of flavor, but not like the palomas and margaritas I'd tried making before. The wine is too sweet. It was at this point that I discovered my new nightly drink, which contained tequila, soda water, and a slice of orange—a drink that would change my life forever.
I spent the next eight years happily making tequila for my friends and family. Every occasion I host or attend, I receive a bottle of tequila. In my house, that's all you get. I never thought about turning this hobby into a business. But then I saw more and more people in my life turning to tequila for the same reasons I did, and the people around me started to demand my drink more and more. Outside of my circle of friends, I started noticing a lot of people ordering tequila as a simple sprite, the same way I drank tequila, and by 2018, I knew I could no longer order tequila Tequila mix is restricted to my kitchen.
I had no experience in the spirits industry - I had "retired" from being a producer in the film industry for 15 years and accepted my new title of "staying in the business" when I decided to become an entrepreneur. - Mom at home. But if I was going to turn it into a business, I knew I would need the help of my sister Nicole Emanuel and our friend Sarika Singh to make it successful. Nicole has experience as CFO at companies including Brit + Co and Refinery29, while Sarika has worked in the food sector her entire career, including managing innovation for brands such as Gimme seaweed snacks. I couldn't do it without them. As two sisters and a girlfriend, we settled on the company name 21 Seeds.
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In the early days, both Nicole and Sarika had full-time jobs. They work around the clock on evenings and weekends to get the job done, while I can handle all the marketing, sales, and content creation while the kids are in school. It was a side project at first and wasn't easy, but we worked well together from the beginning. Going into business with friends and family doesn’t always have a happy ending, but it does with us.
In 2018, when we needed to find a distillery to help us produce tequila from scratch, we took a trip to Mexico and visited five locations. On the last trip of our trip, we quickly realized that things felt noticeably different. We see a lot of women working everywhere. Even the plant manager is a woman, something we've never encountered at other breweries. Tequila is already an extremely male-dominated field, so it feels good to be surrounded by women in the process. We left that day knowing that the Tequila Distillery was the place where we helped bring 21 seeds to life.
On another trip to a distillery, when we were tasting tequila for the first time, we received our first purchase order from a liquor store chain called BevMo! We pitched the product to them before it was finished, thinking they might get a shot or two. Instead, they ordered all three flavors for every location in California—146 locations in total at the time. We don’t even have a website yet. We were so shocked that we initially thought we had read the wrong product order. But it’s true, we all have to work harder to get our first batch done…fast.
21 seeds launched at BevMo! In April 2019, our bottles sold out that summer. When you start your business, you can probably attribute the first hundred or thousand bottles you sell to your direct network and your influence - your family, your friends, and their family and friends. But when we started selling outside of our sphere of influence, it dawned on me that this was no longer just a side hustle; It's a real full-time job.
It wasn't long before celebrities like Jessica Alba and Katie Couric endorsed our products, naturally. We appeared on the Today Show in January 2020, and by June of that year we were on The Oprah Daily's O -List, which was a real "pinch me" moment. Apparently, Oprah also prefers to soak in tequila.
By the end of 2021, our sales had skyrocketed. At that time, we wanted to bring tequila to bars and restaurants across the country, and we knew we needed a partner to help us do that. So when we received a takeover bid for 21 Seeds from multinational drinks company Diageo, it felt like the timing couldn't be better. Diageo's portfolio includes big brands such as Don Julio, Casamigos and Ketel One Vodka, so we knew this would be the perfect home for us as we establish ourselves as one of the best brands in the spirits industry.
In March 2022, approximately three years after we entered the market, we finally achieved historic and record-breaking sales for 21 seeds of a female-founded spirits brand. I'm not at liberty to disclose exact numbers, but to get an offer like this, especially from one of the largest spirits companies in the world, is very gratifying. No morning talk show or celebrity endorsement can come close to that feeling.
Although 21 Seeds reached an important milestone early on, it's still in its infancy. We're working hard to make our tequila available everywhere - bars, restaurants, homes, international markets, you name it. As female founders in the spirits industry, it feels a little uncomfortable with everything we’ve achieved so far.
When you walk into Diageo, there's an entire wall full of pictures of all the founders of the brand, and most of them are men. So seeing the picture of me, Sarika, and Nicole next to them feels like a real win for female entrepreneurs everywhere. If you are a woman looking to enter the spirits industry, or any male-dominated industry, you have to develop your own strategy. Don’t be swayed by what people in the industry tell you. They are serving different people. Their priorities are different from yours. If you believe in your project, a passionate consumer base will undoubtedly find you.
