More Tequila and Mezcal Profits Staying in Mexico as Women Take Helm
Agave spirits are booming. And brands like Casa Del Sol are making sure Mexican women are profiting, too.
From left: Casa Del Sol’s Alejandra Pelayo, Mariana Padilla and Carmen González on an agave farm in Tepatitlán de Morelos, Mexico.
Photographer: Alicia Vera for Bloomberg Businessweek
The first tequila company Carmen González worked for didn’t last long. The owner raced in his car on Thursdays—if he won, he paid her and the other employees; if he didn’t, they’d wait weeks for a paycheck. It was 2008, a time when the liquor industry had turned her home state of Jalisco into the star of one of Mexico’s most famous exports, yet the most prominent women in the field were the ones on billboards, scantily clad.
“As a woman, as a chemist, I wasn’t looked at right,” she says. A laboratory analyst, she was tasked with verifying everything from the sugar content of agave juice to the distilled alcohol’s proof. When she was refused a raise beyond her $100-a-week salary, she walked out. Now, 15 years later, she’s the maestra tequilera (master distiller) at Casa Del Sol Spirits Co., part of a growing roster of tequila companies that are not only elevating women but also basing business decisions around their needs.