Bebemos brings small-batch tequila with San Diego spirit

We wanted to express what we believed was the best tequila in the world,” says Preston Caffrey, CEO and co-founder of Bebemos. Lofty goals, to be sure, for a brand created by partners whose experience until recently was not in distilling but merely drinking the spirit, but that hardly meant a lack of savvy. 

Caffrey’s wife was already operating a successful curated sparkling wine subscription called We Drink Bubbles when the pandemic hit — a boon for many businesses that offered at-home delivery, with alcohol being no exception. The bubbles Caffrey’s wife shares are estate-grown champagnes and sparkling wines whose production is too small to be distributed to the masses, and as he and his best friend Jon Maddux sipped more and more tequila, they began to wonder to themselves whether the same thing she does for sparkling wines existed for small family growers distilling tequila in Mexico. “So, we hopped on a flight and we spent a bunch of time down in Jalisco, meeting families, getting to know people, asking for recommendations, kissing a lot of frogs, but finding some of these incredible farmers that were making arguably the best tequila in the world that no one had ever heard of,” says Caffrey.

Riffing on his wife’s business plan, Caffrey concedes, he and Maddux secured an import and distribution license and launched a quarterly tequila club called (naturally) We Drink Tequila. “What we do is we find a farmer, a family, who is making incredible tequila that isn’t already represented in the United States,” says Caffrey. “Usually they’re so small batch, sometimes even 1,000 or 5,000 bottles.”

Along the way, their relationships with the growers deepened, and conversations arose about how to share these special tequilas on a larger scale rather than the farmers selling the majority of their agave crop for pennies on the dollar to big brands for mass consumption. “They were saying, ‘The tequila that we make and that we sell, we end up making a lot more money on, and we get to express more of our passion. How can we do more of that?’” recalls Caffrey.

Co-founded with Maddux and a third friend, Patrick Tracy, the concept for Bebemos (Spanish for “we drink”) took shape, making its debut this year on Cinco de Mayo. The Encinitas-based tequila brand’s image is a reflection of Caffrey’s beachy upbringing brought to life by Tracy, also Bebemos’ creative director, “kind of a throwback to the late ’60s, early ’70s in Southern California, that cool vibe, fish-tacos-and-tequila-on-the-beach sort of thing,” says Caffrey. Its casual-cool aesthetic conveys the approachability that he enthusiastically professes will make a fan of even ardent tequila naysayers.

“Even people who are like, ‘I do not drink tequila’ — and we all have our tequila stories, so I totally get it — but it’s one of those tequilas that you drink it and you’re like, ‘Oh, that’s not tequila.’ So my hope is for everyone who [says], ‘No, I don’t drink tequila’ is to try it and go, ‘Oh, I’m converted.’”

The tequila is a joven, a lesser-known type that blends blanco tequila with aged versions. “So, what happens when you experience it is there are these layers of flavors that build versus just one singular tone,” explains Caffrey, who’s also a sommelier. “It’s why it also pairs so well with so many different foods, because you get this spiciness and back-end burn from the añejo, and you taste the tannins from the oak barrel, but then you also get this young, fresh smoothness from the blanco, and then a hint of sweetness and almost like oak-vanilla balance from the reposado.” Its uniqueness is likely to be credited for putting Bebemos on the menu in more than 80 locations, just four months since its debut, accounting for about half the company’s business; the other half comes from subscriptions on We Drink Tequila.

“We always said we started with the product itself,” says Caffrey. “A lot of other brands start with the marketing, and then they work backwards and find a product that fits, whereas for us, it’s the attention to detail on how we make the tequila that’s in it.”

Caffrey’s love of Bebemos might only be equaled by his love of San Diego and a pride to call it Bebemos’ home. “This city is really magical. I say it all the time. No matter where we travel — and we’ve lived in Italy and in Spain — when we come back, there’s nothing like San Diego,” he says. “And I think that’s why, even creating a brand, we wanted the DNA of Bebemos to embody San Diego, because we love this place.” bebemostequila.com, wedrinktequila.com