Walk down the tequila aisle and count how many brands were actually built by women. Go ahead. The spirits industry has always claimed women as its most loyal customers, and almost never let them run the show. Mara Smith noticed. She also noticed that every tequila she was drinking was quietly full of additives nobody was disclosing. So she did something about both problems at once.
Key Takeaways
- Inspiro Tequila is one of a small number of certified women-owned spirits brands in the U.S., holding both WBENC and Certified B Corp status.
- Founder Mara Smith left a corporate law and strategy career to build the additive-free tequila brand she couldn’t find anywhere.
- “Women-owned” at Inspiro isn’t a label, women lead every part of the process, from master distiller Ana Maria Romero Mena to the team getting bottles on shelves.
- As a Certified B Corp, Inspiro donates 2% of revenue or 20% of net profits to nonprofits that support female founders.
- Inspiro’s tequilas are made from 100% Blue Weber Agave with no additives: no sweeteners, no glycerin, no coloring. Just agave, water, and yeast.
Not Just “Made for Women” — Actually Made by Them
A lot of brands will slap a feminine aesthetic on their packaging and call it a day. That’s not what this is.
WBENC certification, through the Women’s Business Enterprise National Council, requires a company to be at least 51% owned, controlled, operated, and managed by women. It’s one of the most rigorous women-owned certifications in the country. Very few spirits companies hold it. Inspiro does.
Mara founded the company in February 2020, designed the bottle with her mother, flew to Guadalajara to work with master distiller Ana Maria Romero Mena, and built a team where women lead at every level, from production to the people getting bottles on shelves.
That’s what certified women-owned actually looks like.
She Searched Every Shelf. Then She Built the Brand.
Mara’s path here wasn’t linear, and she’d probably tell you that herself. She started at Mayer, Brown & Platt in Chicago, a big law firm, long hours, the whole thing. Then, moved to corporate strategy at McDonald’s. After, she ended up on emergency bedrest while pregnant with twins. When they arrived prematurely, she left the corporate world with no graceful exit. Just a hard pivot into full-time motherhood.
But she kept thinking about what came next. Tequila was already her drink of choice, what she and her friends ordered on girls’ trips, at dinner parties, at the end of a long week. She started paying closer attention to what was actually in the bottles: sweeteners, glycerin, caramel coloring. The clean, additive-free tequila she was looking for didn’t exist.
So in 2020, she went and made it.
Your Tequila Has a Secret Ingredient List But Inspiro’s Doesn’t.
Most tequila drinkers have no idea this is even possible: additives in tequila don’t have to be disclosed. Brands can add up to 1% of certain ingredients (sweeteners, glycerin, oak extract, caramel color) and the bottle won’t say a word. That percentage sounds small. It isn’t, when you’re specifically reaching for something clean.
Inspiro Tequila uses agave, water, and yeast. That’s the whole list. The Luna Blanco is rested in bourbon barrels so it picks up natural sweetness, no sweetener needed. The Rosa Reposado is the first tequila aged in rosé wine barrels, which gives it a natural rose-gold color and a taste profile that’s genuinely unlike anything else on the shelf.
The flavor comes from the process, not from what gets added after. For women who read labels on everything else they put in their bodies, that’s kind of the whole point.
The Purple Bicycle, the B Corp, and Why Giving Back Is Baked In
When Mara was four years old, someone handed down a purple bicycle that was too big for her. Her parents doubted she could ride it. She didn’t care. She tried, fell, tried again, and eventually rode it herself. That bike experience stuck with her.
It became the symbol for Inspiro’s giving-back initiative, the Purple Bicycle Project, because building a company as a woman tends to feel a lot like that. You’re often on a bike that’s too big, and nobody’s holding the back.
B Corp certification isn’t quick or easy. It requires a company to meet verified standards across social impact, environmental performance, and accountability. Mara completed the process in 2023.
Since then, Inspiro has donated to nonprofits supporting female founders, sponsored pitch competitions for the Women Founders Network, funded grants through the Enthuse Foundation, and in 2025, started subsidizing WBENC certification costs for other women trying to get where Inspiro has been.
From Emergency Bedrest to Entrepreneur
There’s a version of this story that gets packaged as an inspirational comeback. But it’s worth being honest about what it actually took.
Mara didn’t leave her career because she was ready. She left because her family needed her to. She spent years outside a boardroom. When she came back to professional life, there was no company waiting with a corner office. She had to build the whole thing from scratch, at a moment when the world had just shut down for a pandemic.
The skills transferred more than people might expect. Contract negotiation, high-stakes decisions, relentless attention to detail; none of that disappears because you stepped away from a title.
For women figuring out what their own re-entry looks like, Inspiro’s story is a real one: the timeline doesn’t have to follow anyone else’s schedule.
FAQ
Is Inspiro Tequila actually additive-free? Yes. Inspiro is made from 100% Blue Weber Agave with three ingredients: agave, water, and yeast. No sweeteners, no glycerin, no caramel coloring, no oak extract. The brand is a member of the Additive Free Alliance, which independently verifies that status.
What does WBENC certified women-owned actually mean? WBENC (Women’s Business Enterprise National Council) certification confirms that a business is at least 51% owned, controlled, operated, and managed by women. It’s one of the most recognized and rigorous women-owned certifications in the U.S. — not self-declared, independently verified — and very few spirits brands have it.
What is a Certified B Corp and why does it matter? B Corp certification means a company has been independently verified to meet high standards of social and environmental performance, accountability, and transparency. For Inspiro, that commitment shows up as grants, mentoring, and financial support for female founders navigating their own entrepreneurial journeys.
Where can I find Inspiro Tequila? Inspiro is currently available in Illinois, Michigan, Missouri, Tennessee, Georgia, Florida, Massachusetts, Texas, Arizona, and California. You’ll find it at Total Wine, Whole Foods, Binny’s, Jewel/Osco, and Specs, plus independent retailers across all ten states. There’s also a store locator and online ordering at inspirotequila.com.
She Didn’t Wait for a Seat at the Table. She Built One.
The tequila industry didn’t make room for someone like Mara Smith. So she stopped waiting for it to. What started as an aggravating discovery, that every bottle she picked up had additives nobody was talking about, became a certified women-owned, B Corp-certified tequila brand that backs its values with a paper trail: third-party certifications, a public giving initiative, and an ingredient list short enough to memorize.
When you reach for Inspiro, you’re picking a brand that actually does what it says. And it happens to taste really good too.
Cheers to that.
Curious? Find Inspiro Tequila near you at inspirotequila.com.