Ground Up: Talking Women-Owned Small Business with 21Seeds Founder Kat Hantas

A couple sips into a new business plan

Always trust a woman who knows her tequila. Or at least that is something we heard once from a woman sipping tequila—but damned if that isn’t true. Sure, we were also drinking tequila when she told us that but she was incredibly convincing. Keeping that front of mind for the rest of our lives, we wanted to hear from a woman who knows her tequila and business, so much so that she has her own tequila business. Kat Hantas, founder and CEO of 21Seeds tequila knows a lot more than margarita recipes, as someone who is trying to shift the narrative on the drinkability of tequila we wanted to hear from her about a few female-founded brands that are shifting their narratives in their respective industries. What we’re saying is, you should read this article while drinking a cocktail and immediately start online impulse shopping. Look we’re just trying to be helpful.

Photograph of a woman wearing a hat and laying in a hammock. The woman is holding a bottle of 21 Seeds tequila and looking out across a field of toward the end of the day.

Minidip

Always trust a woman who knows her tequila. Or at least that is something we heard once from a woman sipping tequila—but damned if that isn’t true. Sure, we were also drinking tequila when she told us that but she was incredibly convincing. Keeping that front of mind for the rest of our lives, we wanted to hear from a woman who knows her tequila and business, so much so that she has her own tequila business. Kat Hantas, founder and CEO of 21Seeds tequila knows a lot more than margarita recipes, as someone who is trying to shift the narrative on the drinkability of tequila we wanted to hear from her about a few female-founded brands that are shifting their narratives in their respective industries. What we’re saying is, you should read this article while drinking a cocktail and immediately start online impulse shopping. Look we’re just trying to be helpful.

Olive & June

Part of the allure of a perfect manicure is the experience. Sarah Gibson Tuttle, founder of Olive & June, made going to the nail salon a destination in Los Angeles. She brought a sense of fun, comfort and enjoyment back to an age-old practice. And since then, she’s continued to innovate, giving fans a way to create their own version of that experience at-home this past year.

The Honey Pot Co.

Honey Pot founder Beatrice Dixon took what she knew women were looking for elsewhere in beauty and wellness (plant-based, natural ingredients) to innovate within an oft-forgotten area of self-care: feminine care. She took the cloak off the category to deliver clean ingredients in effective products. Plus, having worked at Whole Foods when she founded the company, Beatrice is living proof that the best entrepreneurs are those who get their hands dirty and learn a business from the ground up.

Brightland

Brightland has elevated products you likely use in your home every day: olive oil and vinegar. By bringing trust and transparency to an everyday product (they make authentic olive oils and vinegars from California olives and fruits, with no fillers or artificial preservatives) founder Aishwarya Iyer is helping us better understand and feel good about one of our most used cooking ingredients.

Our Place

Pots and pans are not often thought of as innovative, but that’s exactly what founder Shiza Shahid did with Our Place. She made modern cookware designed for multi-cultural, multi-ethnic, muti-purpose cooking. She thought differently about what we use to cook, by thinking realistically about who is cooking it and what they’re cooking, and it propelled their business forward.


A photograph of Kat Hantas sitting in a chair and wearing sunglasses and a hat.

Kat Hantas is the CEO and co-founder of 21Seeds – real fruit-infused tequila. Eight years ago, when Kat was working in the film industry as a producer, she was told to stop drinking wine by a doctor and turn to distilled spirits instead. But she couldn’t find anything that appealed to her, so Kat took things into her own hands and began infusing tequila with real fruit right in her own kitchen. Flash forward to today, and Kat is running 21Seeds with her two female co-founders: her sister and her best friend.