#IBuiltThis: Raise Your Glass to GEM&BOLT

If you’ve tasted mezcal, you know there’s something special about the smoky, earthy liquid. Mezcal is complex, dark, and polarizing. This week for #IBuiltThis, we’re talking with AdrinAdrina, half of a self-described artist-alchemist female duo who turned their love of and respect for mezcal into a business that’s currently expanding across the United States. Along with her business partner, Elliott Coon, AdrinAdrina learned about the mezcal-making process in Oaxaca, Mexico. The two had already opened speakeasies together in Oakland and Oaxaca, and were infusing mezcal with damiana, a Mexican herb known for its healing properties.  

By 2013, they’d launched GEM&BOLT, their own fair-trade, sustainable mezcal distilled with damiana. The brand started with the two driving mezcal across Mexico from Oaxaca to Tulum for parties and events, and last spring it expanded to Europe. The two founders have since joined forces with Lisa Derman, former COO for Stoli Group USA, and Jody Levy, a beverage industry entrepreneur. As of June, GEM&BOLT is available in select bars in Austin, Texas, including Justine’s, The Townsend, Whisler’s, Tobala and Odd Duck, as well as at liquor stores Twin Liquors and Beverage World. Later this summer it will launch in New York, Los Angeles, and other American cities.

Here’s what the journey has been like for the founders. [pagebreak]

The Latin Kitchen: What were you doing before you started GEM&BOLT?

AdrinAdrina: Ellie and I were an artist duo before we started GEM&BOLT. We actually grew up together in the mountains of Virginia, so I’ve known her since she was born and then we moved into the world and made art on our own, and came together about 10 years ago as an artist duo. We were curators and we would throw very outside-of-the-box art shows that included libations and food. We were pairing cocktails with art way back when.

TLK: When you went to Oaxaca to learn about making mezcal, what were your expectations? Was it purely for fun, or did you have an idea that it might become a business?

AA: We had already started the project GEM&BOLT, which was based on bringing art and plants in from a new angle, and we were making the damiana elixir with mezcal, and we loved mezcal. We were serving mezcal in our speakeasy in Oakland, mezcal infused with damiana. People say that mezcal chooses you and it’s not the other way around, and that was very much what happened. It was not like we decided to go to Oaxaca to start a mezcal brand, but we went to Oaxaca to research mezcal because we were using it in that forum, and we were very much welcomed into the community.

TLK: How did you go from hobbyist to professional?

AA: I would say that it was very much a natural process of education and learning and experimentation, and for us it was very important that we were focused specifically in relation to the damiana element. From the very beginning we were infusing with damiana and then everything was based around the damiana in mezcal. I actually think the big shift came when we stopped infusing and started working with a chemist to refine the damiana element. Because now in the second distillation we add the damiana and at the end there’s a flash of extract, so it creates a much more elegant libation than just infusing. Infusing is amazing, but we don’t infuse. We distill the damiana rather than infusing, which is much different from what most people do with other herbs and botanicals.[pagebreak]

TLK: What was the reception like to the product in Mexico, and why did you launch there before coming to the U.S.?

AA: We were never planning on launching in the U.S. when we started the project. We were planning on going to Europe and staying in Europe, but then, you know, natural progression of a brand and everybody wants us here, so here we are. Pretty much from the Mexico City hipsters to the mezcal community, people were wild about the damiana and espadín combination from the beginning and so that really encouraged us. People from all over the world were trying the beverage and were going wild for it, and we were throwing lots of parties and we were doing festivals, 500 to 2,000 people, and the reception was wild. But when the mezcaleros and the mezcal community were really amazed that it was such an incredible combination, we were like, ‘Okay, we’re covering all bases here.’

TLK: What’s it like to be a woman working in this traditionally male field?

AA: It’s been very exciting. It definitely feels like we’re breaking some ground. But the welcome has been surprisingly warm considering that the spirits industry as well as the mezcal field is [almost entirely] men. But we’ve had a really warm welcome, and we never planned to be four women, it was a really happy accident that definitely feels like it’s perfect timing as women are coming into the forefront in all areas and the playing field is evening. [pagebreak]

TLK: What are the biggest lessons you’ve learned from building and growing GEM&BOLT?

AA: I think that humor will carry you through the most challenging of times — that’s a big one. And that the world is really ready for a brand that thinks outside of the box, with positive ethos. I think that people are really ready for a spirit that’s super elegant and engages the heart, and that’s what we found with the mixture of the damiana and the maguey, which are these two very powerful plants that seem to be heart-openers. And also, a good team is so important when building a company — and that hierarchy is really a thing of the past.

TLK: Where is the company now, and what’s next?

AA: We’re in Austin, Texas, as you know, which we love, and we expect to really have a strong presence there from now until forever. And then we’re expanding in Texas, we’re going to expand into San Antonio and Houston and Dallas and Marfa. I lived in Marfa for a year and a half before I moved to Mexico. It’s a small but powerful little place, and we definitely plan on having a big presence there. And we’re launching in LA and New York City next, so here we come!