Within the current tequila market, it can be easy for some brands to have something of an inferiority complex. Considering the amount of star power that has been injected into the category over the last decade — from George Clooney’s billion-dollar sale of Casamigos to runaway first-year sales for Teremana Tequila (Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson), Los Lobos (LeBron James, Arnold Schwarzenegger) and 818 (Kendall Jenner) — the prospect of finding space for a smaller, non-celebrity, family-run brand to grow can be intimidating.
But that all depends on how you define intimidation: for Alex La Croix, co-founder of Siempre Tequila, those parameters are quite unique. Having been at a point in his life where he was a new father facing the potential of serious jail time for possession of a firearm — and having turned his life around to see his brand become a rising player in the tequila space — has helped put whatever challenges he’s facing in the spirits industry into proper perspective.
With Siempre, La Croix is seeking to steer the conversation around tequila from style to substance. While some of the celebrity brands may inevitably attract more attention to the space, their higher profile also commands a higher price, and in turn reinforce one of the primary misconceptions that La Croix is seeking to break: “Fancy and expensive doesn’t necessarily mean good, though it can,” he said.
“By my rule of thumb, If you think it’s good, it’s good,” La Croix said. “Tequila versions vary — from Walmart to Whole Foods to McDonald’s to Michelin Star to Grandma’s home cooked straight for her garden, and there is no answer to what a good tequila is except your own answer.”
Put to his own brand, the answer to that question is Grandma’s version — sort of. Siempre’s creation was inspired by the grandmother of Monica Sanita, La Croix’s life partner and co-founder, who handcrafted mezcal and other agave-based spirits that she would share with the family. From its manufacturing site Valle de Tequila Distillery in the town of Tequila (Jalisco) in Mexico, Siempre has embraced this low-tech, traditional approach — 100% Blue Weber agave cooked in stone ovens, open air fermentation, water sourced from a local volcanic spring — to create its lineup, which began with the flagship un-aged blanco (“plata”) in 2015 and has since expanded to feature Reposado (aged up to six months in Jack Daniels barrels) and Anejo varieties.
Without a celebrity hyping up the brand, Siempre has taken a simple, patient approach by positioning its ultra-premium tequila as a high quality, yet casual, affordable and hopefully unintimidating choice for everyday sipping or cocktail crafting.
“We keep our prices affordable by keeping our packaging costs and margins down and pass the savings on to the consumer, rather than play on people’s misconceived thought that higher price equals higher quality,” said La Croix. “Overall, we’re the down-to-earth, fun, no-BS brand that is family-owned and started from nothing. So, go ahead and buy bottles of the fancy stuff for your collection and add a few Siempre (bottles) to actually drink with friends and empty.”
Looking ahead to 2022, La Croix said the company’s priority is overall improvement (“Be [more] awesome than the year before,” in his words) as the company aims to expand its team and add to recent distribution gains with Republic National Distributing Co (RNDC) in Colorado and Florida over the second half of 2021. The product is also currently available in Connecticut, Michigan, Oklahoma, Nevada, Nebraska, Florida, Tennessee, Georgia, and New Hampshire.
More fun, however, will be the release of several yet-to-be-revealed “passion project SKUs” to help establish Siempre as a stronger competitor in the category — regardless of what other celebrities may have jumped in the game by that point.
“We’re going to make some elbow room amongst the bigwig tequila brands this year,” La Croix promised.