In these tumultuous times of a pandemic and civil unrest behind the recent deaths of unarmed African-Americans at the hands of the police, brands of all kinds are walking a fine line. Do they speak up and take a stance, no matter what side, and risk alienating some of their consumers? Or do they say nothing… and risk the same. Well, for Angel’s Envy the choice was clear by the statement they made on social media on June 10th (see the full statement below).
One of the strongest statements made by any distillery that we’ve seen, I wanted to know what inspired the Louisville-based brand. I spoke to Angel’s Envy Co-Founder & Chief Innovation Officer Wes Henderson about the statement, how they plan to take action and more for this Bar Time Stories x The Whiskey Lifestyle exclusive.
The Whiskey Lifestyle: What inspired you all to make the statement? How did you get to that point?
Wes Henderson: So it’s painted on our wall outside of the distillery. It is one of our philosophies. And it says, “To revere tradition and embrace progress.” And now more than ever, I think it’s really important for us to think about that as we put in the work towards making real progress happen. There’s definitely no ignoring the black community continues to suffer unjustly because of systematic racism. And we’ve seen that impact at Angel’s Envy in our backyard, with the death of Breonna Taylor here in town. So, it put it even more kind of at the forefront of our thoughts, but. That really was one of the driving thoughts behind it. If we got it painted on a wall, it doesn’t mean anything unless we put it into action.
TWLS: You guys are one of the few whiskey distilleries that have spoken out. Was there any concern when you all were talking internally about making the statement?
WH: There really wasn’t any concern. I think we knew we couldn’t remain silent about this. I think a knee jerk reaction for any business that will be for you to say anything is that, “Oh my gosh, what are people gonna think if I say something.” But silence really isn’t an option. And I don’t judge any of my fellow bourbon industry people for saying or not saying [something]. I think that everybody is in good faith, trying to make sure that what they say, the same as how we felt, was genuine. But the course of action plan that we had was meaningful and impactful. It wasn’t just words on an Instagram page. Iit was something that had deep meaning and actions to back that up. So, that’s kinda how we got there.
TWLS: Those actionable steps are really important. How did the apprenticeship program come about? Was that something you all were already working on?
WH: It wasn’t in our plan. We’ve always been, I think, a diverse organization. There’s definitely a clear underrepresentation of minority distillers and spirits industry professionals. I think this, like a lot of people, has pushed us to realize that we needed to take initiatives that go further. Certainly we’ve always considered those things. We’ve always made that a part of how we do business, but the question becomes “Can we do better?” And I think we can do better. The entire industry can do better. So, now we’re in the early days of building out the program specifics, but I see a potential for a broad range of underrepresented groups in bourbon. I’m talking Black, women Latino… All over the board. They are all underrepresented groups that help to match our company to our consumer base and the world around us. We’ve put together a group internally that is working specifically on this project, the apprenticeship program, and those details will be forthcoming sooner rather than later. And I’m part of that group as well.
But positive and negative reactions, I’m not surprised. If you spend time watching the news or even looking at the comment section on social media, it’s to be expected. But what’s most important to us is making a statement that we knew was right. And truthfully, I don’t see how anybody on this planet could read what we said and what we’re going to do and have a problem with it. In a world that in a world the way it should be, let’s put it like that, what we’re proposing and the things that we said could be an issue. And of course, we know it is an issue to a lot of people, but I have no patience for that. I have no tolerance for that. We were going to say and do what’s right.
TWLS: Finally, that statement [mentioned in the post] ends with “the first step at working towards true progress.” What does true progress look like for Angel’s Envy and/or you specifically?
WH: Oh, wow! There’s a lot there. As I mentioned before, the first steps are concrete steps towards doing what we said we were going to do and doing it in a meaningful way. I think the first steps in progress are the recognition of things that we may not have perceived before or injustices that we allowed to happen over years and years and years. And personally, for me, I think that that has been a big awakening for me to think about things that I never thought about before. It’s not that I never cared about things. I just never thought about these things. And then I think that in some ways, we all take things for granted and to have an opportunity to really understand where other people are coming from, where our fellow humans are coming from is a turning point in the world. It is a great chance to finally start to make things better and make things right. And to waste that opportunity would be a horrible thing to do. So I love how our company’s grown. I love how we’ve been very supportive already of social issues and other things like that, but I like how we’ve grown. Personally, I like how I’ve been able to learn and listen. And then by all of our actions and we do the right thing. That’s what it’s all about.
