Welcome to the first November edition of your favorite newsletter! November is also the month of both Lui and I’s birthdays 🥳 Happy belated Lui! This week we are looking at the nuances of the location choice for this year’s Diageo World Class Competition and some other breaking news (again) in the tequila industry.

Looking forward this month, I am hoping to talk about the impact of cuts to SNAP benefits and to highlight the people in our industry that are stepping up to fill the gaps in these trying times. If you know of a local (to you) restaurant or food pantry that may be able to provide meals to those who need it most please reach out on our website or to me (Shayne) directly via my email which I will link at the end of this newsletter.

Concerns From the LGBTQIA+ Community Ahead of the Next Big Competition

The Diageo Sponsored cocktail competition, formerly done in partnership with the United States Bartenders Guild (USBG), is the subject of a growing number of concerns regarding its host city. The renowned competition is an annual global gathering of the best of the best bartenders from around the world. Like the Olympics, this competition is hosted by a different city in a different country each year. After this year’s win by Norwegian bartender Felice Capasso in Toronto, Canada he was invited, like others before him, to the next year’s competition.

In a post on Instagram freelance whiskey writer/educator Kristiane Westray asked, “Should Diageo World Class head to Dubai next year? It’s a complex, nuanced conversation, and one that needs to be had.” Westray (formerly Krisitane Sherry) is not only an incredibly skilled and well-respected professional in the whiskey and spirits industry she is also a member of the LGBTQIA+ community herself. She dives deeper into the nuances of the location pick in an article written for her website.

Westray has input from other queer industry professionals on both sides of the issue. For some the need to show up is a matter of representation, one responder even referenced how being an “out” gay man in countries like Qatar and Saudi Arabia made him feel that his was moving the drive towards social progress along faster. He also became a safe space for at least one other colleague when working in these countries, being one of the first that this person came out to as queer.

There are others that don’t think the risk to personal safety is worth competing this coming year. It’s understandable that they would be worried. As Westray writes in her article: “By the letter of the law, queer people who date in the United Arab Emirates face up to fourteen years in prison. Transgender people, and people who express their gender outside of the binary, are also criminalised. There are no hate crime protections.” This all comes in addition to concerns about other human rights issues. The article highlights labor rights and the slavery-like conditions many migrant workers face in the country, which just officially abolished slavery in the 1960’s.

Some things not mentioned in the article but brought up in the comments section of the Instagram post are also worth noting. One commenter pointed out that the UAE also has laws against public intoxication which poses some safety issues for those attending the event regardless of sexuality or gender identity. A couple other commenters mentioned the genocide in Sudan being supported by Dubai and the UAE.

Obviously this is a very complicated subject and there is never going to be a perfect place to host something like this but the concerns being voiced are definitely worth discussing. When it comes to personal safety it is up to each individual to decide if the perceived risk is worth entering the competition. Putting pressure on Diageo to make assurances about competitor and attendee safety doesn’t seem like a bad idea either.

Class Action Lawsuit Filed in Miami Claims Kirkland Signature Añejo Cristalino Isn’t Technically Tequila at all

Once again we have Felisa Rogers at Mezcalistas to thank for keeping us up to date on all the adulteration news. News dropped on Halloween that Kirkland was the latest brand analyzed with NMR (Nuclear Magnetic Resonance) testing to show incredibly low levels of agave despite labeling the product as 100% agave. If you’re just joining us we’ve tried to keep our readers up to date on the tequila adulteration lawsuits and the wider landscape that brought us here. Our October 24th newsletter was our most recent update and in it we briefly explain how the science behind these NMR tests work.

According to Rogers, the lawyers filing the lawsuit against Kirkland claim to have proof that the tequila has so much cane alcohol in it that it doesn’t even qualify as a mixto tequila. That means by definition, if these tests prove what they claim, Kirkland Signature Añejo Cristalino is not even tequila at all. They also call into question the other iterations of Kirkland Signature tequila since they all are supposedly made form the same base spirit.

In this case there might actually be some ignorance as opposed to intentional misleading from the defendant. Since Kirkland Signature is made by a tequila producer under a contract (NOM 1173) proving that Costco intentionally mislabeled the product may not be possible.

Okay so this isn’t something I just saw this week, I’ve actually been enjoying these guys videos for a very long time. I haven’t been scrolling TikTok as hard as I used to but I would always stop to watch these “Can it Kirkland?” videos whenever they came up. I had to let you all in on my attempt at a witty subheading and share the silly joy of these videos. When I saw the news about Kirkland’s tequila lawsuit all I could think was “It CAN’T Kirkland!”

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Email Shayne at [email protected] with any resources from your local area you may be willing to share to help others facing food insecurity.