Midway through a personalized tasting at Casa Guipzot, a West Side shop and tasting room dedicated exclusively to the wines of Mexico, Salena Guipzot casually dropped an intriguing comment: "The majority of winemakers now in Mexico are women."
When challenged, she admitted that the observation is anecdotal — although she does attend many trade events in-country in the process of both educating herself and selecting Mexican wines to offer in San Antonio. Globally, the estimates range from 10% to about 18%.
And historically, with the possible exception of three undaunted widows in post-Napoleonic France's Champagne region — Clicquot, Bollinger and Pommery are all prestige brands to this day — wine has long been a man's world. For women, inheritance through the death of their husbands was the primary path to positions of power in the business up until the 1970s, not only in France but in the United States, according to industry sources.
Fortunately, that's all changing.
In the wider wine world, women winemakers' names adorn bottles from Argentina to Australia, and the numbers of female certified sommeliers are rapidly increasing. Beyond that, women not only purchase more wine than men at the retail level, but they're often the sellers and educators who help us understand more about the craft and what's now available on the market.
Which brings us back to Casa Guipzot. A guided tasting of three wines will set you back $35, and it's pretty much a guarantee that you will never have tasted any of the wines.
Even before the first cork is drawn, Guipzot, a third-generation West Sider, will quiz you about preferences, then regale you with a little Mexican wine lore: 15 states in Mexico are making wine, for example, and the oldest winery in the Americas is Casa Madero, dating from 1597. Then she'll produce something to taste — in my case, a chardonnay from Cava Quintanilla in San Luis Potosí. It was cool, with hints of melon and green herbs — and she sells the bottle for $52.
When I asked about price resistance, Guipzot explained that she's experienced little: "I just sold six bottles last night." Despite premium pricing, she also said that she thinks of her place — "the only exclusively Mexican wine shop in the U.S." — as being a community space, especially for women.
To further Guipzot's commitment to diversity, she has also forged a partnership with Alamo Colleges to encourage Chicanos and women to get into wine. Wine tours to Mexico and an upcoming program that combines a wine tasting with entertainment provided by a Mexican opera singer only further her goal of "curating experiences" around wine. If Mexican wine doesn't become the next big thing, it won't be for lack of trying on Guipzot's part.
And the business appears to be more than a flash in the proverbial pan. Casa Guipzot just completed a year in business.
Certified Sommelier Hailey Pruitt also recently celebrated her first year as director of the wine program at The Cellar and Mixtli, San Antonio's most ambitious Mexican restaurant.
Like Guipzot, she also has a love of Mexican wines. But the two women's paths into the wine business could hardly be more different. Guipzot, with no previous experience, had an epiphany tasting wines on a trip to her husband's home state of Coahuila. Pruitt came into wine in a more traditional way: she started in the service industry while initially pursuing a degree in bio-medical science at Texas A&M, worked her way up from waitressing, to hosting, to wine and cocktails.
In pursuit of higher levels of wine knowledge, Pruitt took a job developing the program at a restaurant in Bryan.
"We chose mostly natural and organic wines, but the clientele wasn't really ready for it then," she admitted.
Family reasons then brought her to San Antonio, which she saw as "a fresh market." Her determination to become a sommelier kicked into gear as she worked in private events and banquets to prepare for tackling the rigorous exams. Almost daily for a year, she and her domestic partner, David, got up each morning and did blind tastings all the while studying for the first-level exam, which includes knowledge of grape varietals, geographic regions and history.
Both passed the initial exam in Febaruary 2022. From there, she decided to tackle the second — the tasting and serving portion — which she passed that same December.
"I don't personally feel much prejudice as a woman in the industry," Pruitt said. "I don't find it's a boy's club ... and at Mixtli, the level of creative control I'm allowed is gratifying."
The restaurant's menu featured nine bottles of wine, none of them Mexican, when she arrived. Now, there are now upwards of 160, of which 21 are currently Mexican. At The Cellar, which has seats for 12, she conducts wine classes and tastings and also hosts an independent wine club with a focus on Texas wines. One of her recent tastings focused on woman owner-winemakers.
Pruitt has also had requests for personal cellar consultation and will soon direct Mixtli's own subscription wine program. All this in addition to contemplating her attack of the next levels of professional certification, the exams for Advanced Sommelier and Master Sommelier. In the U.S. only 25 women are among the ranks of the latter.
But despite all the gilt-edged diplomas, Pruitt strives to keep her wines as undaunting as she is in person.
"I don't ever want anybody to feel bad about their preferences," she said. "If they want a big Napa Cab with their ceviche, then that's what I'll serve them."
With women such as Guipzot and Pruitt leading the charge, each in her own way, this former beer city's collective palate is clearly in good hands.
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