Welcome back to FTW’s Beverage of the Week series. Here, we mostly chronicle and review beers, but happily expand that scope to any beverage that pairs well with sports. Yes, even cookie dough whiskey.
I had never heard of 818 Tequila for two reasons. The first is that I’m not a big tequila drinker, leaving me abreast only of the big names — your Cuervos and Patrons and Espolons, mostly. The second is that I am someone’s dad, woefully out of touch with popular culture that doesn’t revolve around various FX/FXX shows and largely unaware of the business ventures of Miss Kendall Jenner.
Jenner, like George Clooney, Dan Aykroyd and Peyton Manning before her, is now in the spirits business. Her brand, 818, was founded in 2021 and quickly gained the kind of cachet that comes with 280 million Instagram followers. The official company account clocks in at 1.1 million, which seems low by comparison but is still five times larger than White Claw’s following.
(There’s a larger debate here about the role of cultural appropriation in the rise of American celebrities adopting traditional Mexican spirits and culture to make money, particularly when it comes to a family as ubiquitous as the Kardashian/Jenner clan. I assure you I am not the right person to talk to about this. I am just here to drink it, but I do understand the concern.)
I was fortunate not only to get some for sampling, but to get a fifth of 818’s ultra-luxe Eight Reserve, which comes in a very nice, unique eight-shaped ceramic bottle that also happens to look like the world’s least convenient vape pen. And since I’m a relative tequila neophyte, I also reached out to 818’s Director of Tequila David Yan Gonzalez to talk me through it (in between our shared concerns over why the Dallas Cowboys aren’t better).