Overcoming Tragedy to Create Hermanas Amigas Tequila

Toya Banks’s comfortable world was shattered about six years ago, when her husband of 18 years died suddenly. “I became a single parent overnight,” said Banks, a native of Chicago’s South Side whose daughter, Rebecca, was 12 at the time. Banks had just lost her beloved brother, and her mother’s death followed the next year. “I couldn’t do anything,” she said.

But four of her closest friends — all highly educated, professionally successful African-American women — stepped up as her guardian angels. One stayed with her for two months; another cooked dinner for them every Sunday; another made sure Rebecca made it to school; and another would simply listen to Toya cry.

“They took time out of their busy lives to make sure that their best friend was able to make it,” said Banks. “These are the women who nursed me back to life. They’re my sister-friends.”

One tradition they started was sipping on fine tequila together every Friday night. While they enjoyed the liquor, they realized that most of the tequila branding was masculine in style — certainly nothing that spoke to Black women in Chicago. “We were buying high-end tequila, but nothing represented us,” said Banks, whose own healthcare career involves running a company that trains international doctors to get their American licenses.

Once back on her feet, Banks decided to spearhead her own tequila brand as a means of thanking her sister-friends. “It was a wild idea, but they didn’t need anything from anywhere else,” said Banks, who spent three years taking Hermanas Amigas Tequila from an idea to store shelves. “This is a love letter in a bottle.”

Santa Barbara is central to this saga. Banks and her husband had just celebrated their 18th anniversary by staying at El Encanto a month before he died, and they were already in love with the region. “This was going to be the place where we were going to retire,” she said. “We love Santa Barbara. We love Summerland. We love Montecito. That was our dream.”

Their daughter had a similar vision, applying only to California schools for college. Rebecca found a perfect fit at Westmont, so Toya moved to be near her daughter. “I felt like I couldn’t stay in Chicago without her,” she said.

During those years is when she put her own tequila plans in motion. With Rebecca safely living in Westmont’s dorms, Toya would fly down to Puerto Vallarta and travel to Guadalajara and Tequila in the state of Jalisco to develop her brand with a producer named Proveedora y Procesadora de Agave Tres Hermanos. Other than making the booze, she didn’t need much help, as she had the vision for the interlocking arms and four women on the label already in mind.

“I wanted something that represented us,” said Banks, who now sells her tequila at three dozen stores in Illinois while slowly gaining traction in California too. “These are all educated women at the top of their game, and we all like a nice tequila.”

“Bonds that aren’t breakable” is the motto, which is also playing into her next project: a canned cocktail called Unbreakable that incorporates the tequila with strawberry syrup, lemon juice, and grapefruit bitters from Denmark.

Rebecca, meanwhile, graduated from Westmont last May, is studying to go to law school, and was recently accepted to a program in Oxford, England. “She loves my tequila,” said Toya, and she’s also now a West Coast girl. “My daughter is never coming back to Chicago.” 

Crafted in a silver, or blanco, Hermanas Amigas Tequila is extremely smooth, nearly sweet in style, but potent as expected at 80 proof. It’s easy to drink straight, or with a cube of ice, like Banks prefers. Costing $65 to $70, it would also work quite well in a margarita.

She’s working on getting a tasting together in Santa Barbara soon, and was recently able to give another Chicago-in-Santa Barbara celebrity, Oprah Winfrey, a bottle during an event at Godmothers Books in Summerland.  

Said Banks, “I just want people to taste this tequila that’s truly made with love.”

Seehermanasamigastequila.com.