Cover story: Social Grace Vodka

In the spirit of giving, women launch new premium vodka

A spirits brand with a splash of philanthropy, powerful mission

By Jill Moon

jmoon@thetelegraph.com

EDWARDSVILLE — A pair of women who met playing golf a couple years ago at Sunset Hills Country Club became fast friends and recently business partners with their Social Grace Vodka brand.

Social Grace Vodka is now among an elite group of businesses — woman-owned spirit companies. Owned and operated by Christa Guilbeault, of Glen Carbon, and Denise Arendell, of Edwardsville, the vodka was created with women in mind, although it is intended for all vodka drinkers.

You can already find Social Grace Vodka in many local restaurants, including Wang Gang, Moussalli’s Prime and EXO Lounge and Nail Bar, as well as Dierbergs Edwardsville Crossing. It will also be in a new restaurant coming to the area, Edley’s BBQ, out of Nashville, Tennessee, and they have verbal commitments from Chava’s Mexican Restaurant, Obar, 1818 Chophouse and others, Guilbeault said.

“Our vodka is naturally gluten-free and distilled on an eighth-generation farm locally.”

“Our bottle design is truly magical. It’s classy, it’s elegant and you’ll want to pick it up.”

And, Social Grace Vodka is one of only a handful of woman-owned spirit companies in the U.S., Arendell noted.

But why vodka?

“As far as women are concerned, it is very low in carbs, low in calories and naturally gluten free,” Arendell explained.

“Vodka is also simple to make. There’s no aging process, like with whiskey, bourbon or wine, and we can get it to market quicker. Vodka can be made from any grain: wheat, potato, corn.

“We use white corn instead of yellow corn like our competitors use,” Guilbeault noted. “White corn is a little sweeter and a little smoother than traditional corn. We use the finest locally family grown white corn to create a true grain-to-glass experience. We’ve conducted many taste tests and know we have a truly superior premium vodka.

“Our vodka has a sweet hint of agave, without any added sugars,” she said.

Social Grace Vodka is six times distilled and 80 proof, with a smooth finish.

“We are marketing toward women, but we know men will purchase our vodka, as well,” said Guilbeault, of which her husband enjoys, and so does Arendell’s, both of whom are extremely supportive of the new spirit company, they said.

“It’s a high-end premium vodka and we give back 10 percent of our net profits.”

The pair established a Social Grace Vodka signature drink contest, seeking a female mixologist to create and name this special cocktail. A dozen Edwardsville/Glen Carbon establishments participated for a cash prize and naming rights.

“Each mixologist created up to five cocktails for us,” Guilbeault explained.

They plan to announce the winner in the next week or so.

From the creation of Social Grace Vodka, an intentionally high-end product, to its carefully designed bottle to its marketing and philanthropic causes, women mark its every aspect and characteristic.

“We began working on a business plan, marketing pitch, and what that would look like,” Arendell explained. “We interviewed several distilleries, both local and not. Some are willing to do contract distilling and will make and bottle your product that are local.

They did end up choosing a local distillery that uses their family’s eighth generation farm and grows the white corn.

“We knew when we met them, they were the ones for us,” Arendell said.

The pair met with the distiller last year, in May, and the next month, on June 3, signed documents to form a limited liability company as Social Grace Vodka.

“Exactly one year later, on June 3, 2021, we got to see our cases loaded on to trucks to send to market,” Guilbeault recalled.

“It was incredible, one year to the day!” Arendell exclaimed.

It was important to use companies made up of mostly women or female-owned, particularly because of marketing toward women.

“We went to Cork Tree Creative, in Edwardsville,” Guilbeault said. “They met with us and listened to what we wanted — all through Zoom, over the pandemic last year.”

Cork Tree, made up of mostly female professionals, held an in-house contest for its graphic designers, who submitted entries for the bottle design.

“The woman on our bottles is very important to us,” they said. “The woman does not to have a face because we didn’t want an ethnicity. We wanted her to be whatever anybody saw her to be. The logo, the design, all came from Cork Tree.”

“We interviewed different marketing firms, and they were definitely perfect for our company,” Guilbeault said. “The bottle represents our brand perfectly.”

The bottle, as well as the product, is made in the U.S.A., but the local entrepreneurial friends had bottle samples of different shapes from all over the world to study.

“We had fun going into Friar Tuck late at night, placing our bottle on shelves, making sure ours stood out as something different,” Arendell said. “Our community is so supportive of local, and accepting of what we’re doing.”

For bottle production, they went to Ink360, out of Wisconsin, which specializes in 360-degree wraparound, direct-to-bottle printing for short-run, smallbatch craft beverages.

“When we submitted all our designs to them, Lia Fanning completely blew us away!” Guilbeault recalled. “She took our designs from Cork Tree, and laid them out to what our bottles look like today.

“Lia was instrumental in designing this bottle. She put our woman on the back of the bottle and the woman looks through the vodka,” she explained.

Arendell and Guilbeault traveled to Wisconsin early this spring and got to see their bottles come off the line.

“They handed each of us a bottle when the first two came off production,” Guilbeault said. “That was so exciting for us, to be there.”

Their next step was to work with packaging for shipping and logistics, for which they hired Packaging Logistics Inc., based in Minneapolis, Minnesota, and worked with its owner, Rachael Nelson.

Since Social Grace Vodka is premium, it ships in cases of six, instead of 12, and requires a premium packaging carton design, both for cost and branding.

“It was important that all four sides and the top of the cartons had our logos and trademarks on them,” Guilbeault explained. “Rachael worked with us on the design.”

Nonprofit organizations to which Social Grace Vodka will give 10% of net profits will be based on sales within regions of states in which the product sells. Now, the brand is only distributed in Illinois, by Koerner Dis-

see SOCIAL GRACE VODKA, Page 7