Building the First Black Hispanic Woman-owned Tequila Brand

Welcome to Part 2 of our Latino Owned Newsletter launch!

Tequila is in our DNA as Latinos and in our culture! Which is why I’m excited to bring Kat’s story and tequila brand Josefina to Latino Owned. 💻

Meet Kat Tinsley, the CEO and Founder of Josefina, a tequila brand rooted in legacy and sustainability. I met with Kat as she walked me through her journey as a founder currently fundraising to bring Josefina to life, and her passion behind building the brand. ⤵️

At home alone and on Zoom, Kat had just turned 21, sipping her first drink with friends on a screen instead of a bar. A pivotal experience has now shifted how this new generation interacts with alcohol.

“ A very Gen Z, niche, 21 experience, right? Many of us don't drink because we weren't introduced to alcohol 'cause of the pandemics. So it's really shifted our relationship with it,” Kat says.

“I’d walk the aisles in my mask, alongside my mom, trying to figure out what tequila even was. I knew I liked it. I knew my body reacted differently to it.  I had questions about additives because sometimes I would have a tequila and I felt great. Other times I'd have a tequila, and my lips were swollen.

I had all these questions. What are the sustainability practices? Where are the Latinos in ownership, and I don’t just mean the faces on the bottle. I mean the real equity, the manufacturing power, the decisions.

I grew up with so much admiration for Mexican culture, surrounded by it. But I still questioned: Am I the right person to ask these questions? To fill this gap?”

As a half Black, and half Puerto Rican from Chicago, Kat knew the Latino culture, and knew the gap she could fill. These questions and curiosity birthed the journey of starting Josefina.

Rooted in Heritage

Kat named Josefina in honor of her grandmother, who was born in Puerto Rico in 1939, and moved to New York City. “We named this brand Josefina not just to honor her, but to reclaim her. To center the woman she always was, before the world asked her to soften or shrink. She wasn’t rich in dollars, but she was rich in style, presence, and pride.”

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“She was a teenage bride, a teenage mother and a  brilliant woman who taught herself English,” Kat explains. “She read a book a day, but inherited a world and a reality, and a system that gave her very few options. And despite all of that, every single day of her life, she chose luxury. She chose to live lavishly. She chose to live a full life.”

“She saved for Neiman Marcus bags. She wore fur coats and gold earrings. She had ten piercings, five in each ear so she could wear all her favorite earrings at once. She always showed up looking good,” Kat says.

“I hope that when consumers are buying Josefina and they're drinking it, they feel that essence and that energy. I want black and brown folks to know that luxury is not something that that is denied to them.”

Raising Money

Kat is currently doing a Kickstarter for Josefina, to fully fund its first production run of Josefina, and get them to enter the market and retail. Although Kickstarter wasn’t Kat’s first choice, its proven to open doors to conversations with potential investors learning about Josefina and having larger conversations about buying into the brand.

Kickstarter has became a vessel not just for funding, but for visibility. Even if Kat doesn’t hit the goal, the campaign has brought the right people into the orbit.

There is a deeper conversation on the world of raising money from investors, that lead to a big disparity of the amount of money Black and Brown entrepreneurs get, (if they even get into the room of investors).

It can often feel like Latinos and Black entrepreneurs need to already have a track record of a profitable business, just to even get a little piece of that VC money. 💰

Kat explains her experience in raising money: ⤵️

“It’s hard fundraising as a person, period. When you add in the boxes you fill, it becomes even more complex and layered. From the founder perspective, it often feels like we are expected as Latinos, as Black folks, especially when you add women to the equation, to be significantly further along in the founder journey and receive less funding.”

“Pitching to investors, they would say, I love this concept! Great idea! I want you to retail for three years before I write a check. You know, and then you watch documentaries and you see people who don't fill those boxes and they're getting billions of dollars for stuff that doesn't exist.”

“That would make me upset and I'd get sad and I would just say, you know what, we've gotta be creative. We've gotta be scrappy.”

Building with Intention, Not Appropriation

Josefina has been a concept for Kat since 2021, and this momentum in getting the brand out there, starting the kickstarter, and really focusing in on building the first Black Hispanic woman-owned tequila brand, is exciting for Kat.

From the beginning, Kat prioritized working with manufacturers and creatives in Mexico.🇲🇽 Building Josefina isn’t about building a brand, it’s about building bridges. “I will continue to prioritize building bridges with people down in Mexico. That is a priority for me as an individual because I want it to be appreciation, not appropriation.”

A Toast to Josefina

Josefina isn’t just going to be a product. It’s an experience. It’s legacy, luxury, and fully Latina Owned.

“Obviously I wanna be successful and be profitable, but to me this is more than just money. I want people to understand that they deserve luxury. That that is the energy I hope we capture. Not just in our bottle, but in the community we're building,” Kat says.

Josefina is now live on Kickstarter. Learn more about the story, the bottle, and the mission by following on Instagram: Drink Josefina

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