Gaining a Seat at the Table: SIA Scotch Founder Carin Luna-Ostaseski Reflects on Her Experience as a Woman in the Whisky Industry

There is no question that whisky is a man’s game — or is there? In 2012, Carin Luna-Ostaseski raised almost $50,000 on crowdfunding platform Kickstarter to help launch her SIA Scotch Whisky project with one question in mind: How do we bring younger consumers to this beautiful spirit?

At the time of the launch, she was not only one of the few female founders in the whisky industry but also one of the first Hispanic entrepreneurs to ever build a scotch whisky brand. In this exclusive interview, we speak with Luna-Ostaseski about her experience as a woman in the whisky industry and how she gained a seat at the table — from Kickstarter to running the successful SIA Scotch Whisky Brand.

Luna-Ostaseski never thought she would be a scotch drinker. In fact, it was a drink she had always associated with her grandfather. That all changed one night when her friend invited her out for a glass.

“I was a graphic designer for almost 17 years, but my passion has been whisky for a really long time,” Luna-Ostaseski said. “In my early 20s, my friend asked me if I wanted to grab a glass of scotch after work, and I said, ‘That’s my grandfather’s drink.’ He responded, saying, ‘You just haven’t found your brand yet.’

“At that time I was such a cliche,” Luna-Ostaseski continued. “I was living in New York, drinking Cosmos, like head to toe, all black, like all ‘Sex in the City.’

That night, Luna-Ostaseski tried four new whiskies, at the behest of her friend.

“The bartender was telling me stories about the distilleries and the blenders, and I was captivated,” Luna-Ostaseski said.

Luna-Ostaseski began traveling to Scotland to further immerse herself in the scotch world, where she began experimenting with blending whisky from her own collection.

“I started going to Scotland quite a bit to research and then eventually just making blends in my kitchen out of a collection that I amassed through the course of a breakup. I had extra money I didn’t need for couples counseling anymore.”

With that extra cash, Luna-Ostaseski began making blends from her collection and hosting scotch tasting events.

“That’s where I started convincing people who are not typically scotch drinkers to become one,” she said. “And so much of that was approachability. The versatility, cocktails and packaging.”

Luna-Ostaseski guided this writer through a tasting.

The Tasting

As I tasted the scotch, I was immediately hit with very smooth vanilla notes. I was blown away by how easy it was to drink, even mentioning the sipping experience feels very similar to bourbon.

“It’s a blend so you get malting grade whiskies. 40% malt whiskey, so it’s about double what a typical blend has, which makes it very smooth, approachable, easy drinking,” Luna-Ostaseski said. “Lots of notes of vanilla and caramel on the nose. The goal was to not get any smoke on the nose.”

A female, Cuban-American founder is not the only thing that sets SIA apart. Luna-Ostaseski was just as thoughtful about the name and the bottle as she was the whisky inside it.

“It doesn’t look like a typical Scotch bottle, right? It’s not green glass or brown glass with a name that you can’t pronounce,” she said. “Not overly masculine or overly feminine. It’s for everybody.”

Good enough to beat out a Johnnie Walker blend at the 2016 Ultimate Spirits Challenge and priced below $50, the whisky is quality and accessible.

The name “Sia” came from the Scottish-Gaelic word for “six,” because the original blend comprised six whiskies, Luna-Ostaseski explained.

Luna-Ostaseski landed on the shape of the bottle by asking bartenders to ask for their input on what they wanted in a bottle. This led to the final design, a clear bottle with a long neck.

$250K grant program for your #smallbusiness @SIAScotchWhisky has teamed up w/ @helloalice @WValderrama to launch The Entrepreneurial Spirit Fund-Apply for the $10k in grants for entrepreneurs of color at https://t.co/0ZgCO5Iy7U #SIAScotchFund #grants #BIPOC #funding #entrepreneur pic.twitter.com/UXSlP1b3za

— SIA Scotch Whisky (@SIAScotchWhisky) July 14, 2021

As an entrepreneur, Luna-Ostaseski knows the importance of having a strong support system. That’s why she prioritizes maintaining a philanthropic company that gives back to underrepresented people in business.

“Being an entrepreneur is a very lonely path,” Luna-Ostaseski said. “And you’re always trying to convince everybody that everything’s going great, but behind the scenes, things are falling apart. And so it’s nice to have like a safety net of women or community.”

She knows firsthand the struggle it can be not only to get a seat at the table to get her product in front of investors but just to get into the room. Now, she’s working to alleviate that problem for other underrepresented people working to build their own businesses.

“I think a challenge that is common across any industry for women is fundraising. Just being able to get into a room of people to fundraise is difficult, because the majority of the investors are men, but where I lived, in the Bay Area, it was also tech,” Luna-Ostaseski said. “So, it’s very hard to talk about a product that exists on shelves with trucks and warehouses in a world where they just care about software.”

While seeking funding, Luna-Ostaseski found herself in rooms with people who didn’t look like her or share her experiences.

“They don’t fully understand how hard it is to get a seat at that table,” she said. “And they think it’s easy. Investors would think I have 10 of these [meetings] lined up. No, it took me months to get this one meeting.”

Luna-Ostaseski explained that brands formed by underrepresented entrepreneurs tend to struggle in the funding department, which puts a cap on sales, visibility and awareness.

“There should exist some form of programs or some opportunities for underrepresented brands to have a seat at the table,” she said.

This is what motivated Luna-Ostaseski’s desire to remain as charitable as possible.

“Every year since I started SIA, I gave whatever I could toward helping underrepresented entrepreneurs: women, female entrepreneurs, minority entrepreneurs,” Luna-Ostaseski said.

Always, but especially during March, Women’s History Month, we salute Carin Luna-Ostaseski and all the amazing women out there who are smashing glass ceilings for their tenacity in the face of adversity.

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