‘RECLAIM BEER FOR WOMEN’
EQUITY BREWING CO. SERVES UP ADVOCACY ALONGSIDE ALES
Beer wasn’t part of the original plan when Suzette Grillot began dreaming up what is now Equity Brewing Co., 109 E Tonhawa St., Suite 100, in Norman. • Grillot’s initial focus was to create a co-working space and build community. • “It came from — for me as an older person who’s been in my career for 30 years — a real desire to create my own work environment that was not toxic, that was free from oppression, that was safe. For me, for my daughter, for my colleagues, and for our customers,” she said. • Grillot soon realized that she needed more than a co-working space, a fact that opening just months before the pandemic confirmed. Grillot’s love for beer inspired the decision to start a brewery with her daughter, Hannah Grillot.
“I moved back to Oklahoma to start this project and have been here ever since,” Hannah Grillot said. “Obviously my mother and I have always been very close. We get along very well.”
With the pandemic, the pair were given time to plan and build the business before it’s official launch in July 2020.
“There was an industry that needed some disruption,” Grillot said. “We needed a wonderful social product that would bring people together and create space together. Beer does that automatically. There’s a long history of women in beer and then being kicked out of beer when it became a commodity, so we were like ‘We’re going to reclaim beer for women.’”
Oklahoma is home to nearly 60 craft breweries, of those Equity is the only one entirely owned by women. This is a stark contrast to the history of brewing across the world in which women are lauded as the creators and overseers of beer and the brewing profession.
As far back as ancient Sumeria and Egypt the goddesses Ninkasi and Hathor, respectively, were said to have given “the gift of fermentation to humanity,” according to Craft Beer & Brewing Magazine.
“Everybody stands out in some way, shape or form, but you know, some really stand out in the terms of the challenges they face like being oddballs in an industry that is not run by people like us,” Suzette Grillot said.
“Not yet,” her daughter, Hannah Grillot, quipped back. “We don’t want to be the only woman-owned brewery.”
Reclaiming a small part of history is just a bonus for the ownership team, now consisting of the Grillots and their chef, Yvonne Menja, who are looking to continue three years spent building a community and a brand that’s vision and work is not typical for most breweries.
Equity officially launched its kitchen on May 5. Many breweries and taprooms do not have kitchens, in part because they require additional money, licensing, staff, product and skills to operate.
“I was out at another brewery one day just last week, actually […] and they said, you know, congratulations on the kitchen,” Suzette Grillot said. “You are ahead of the curve here and you are doing exactly what breweries are doing on the East and West Coast, so you’re ahead of it. And it’s really interesting to learn that we’re ahead of the curve.”
Launching a brewery kitchen
Because of their own close relationship, when the duo began the process of expanding to include a full kitchen, they knew they needed someone who felt like family to help bring the vision to life. That’s where Menja, who had been a regular customer and Equity supporter since the brewery’s start, came in.
“Yvonne’s become like another daughter to me. I feel like the mom of the place for sure,” Suzette Grillot said. “Everyone who works here could be my children.”
Starting from the vestiges of a pandemic side hustle, Menja began working with Equity in the fall of 2022 by providing the Grillots with pastries, and adding new menu items over time.
“I brought in the samples and she bought them instantaneously, and it was a natural progression of adding more things here and there,” Menja said.
What’s on the menus at Equity Brewing Co.?
Before Menja joined the team, Equity’s food menu included simple foods they could prep under cottage laws like charcuterie and basic flatbreads. Meats that had to be cooked were not an option until the full kitchen was complete. Since coming on board, Menja has created a menu that aims to offer something for everyone.
Today, charcuterie and flatbreads are still on the menu, but Menja has added new flavors to the Equity kitchen bringing things like Hot Honey Chicken, the Full Pour Burger and Half Pint Sliders and vegan gnocchi in seasonal sauce to the table. She also whips up weekly chef ’s specials and has plans try new items and adjust the menu for seasonality.
“I wanted customers to still feel as though there was, like, some familiarity with what was offered before, so we did a lot of testing amongst just the people that were here having a beer,” Menja said.
Meanwhile, on the wall at Equity, you’ll find 23 taps with styles ranging from the original “Solidarity Saison” and Ninkasi IPA (named for the goddess discussed earlier) to the brands newer venture hard seltzers.
“I started with one beer that I brewed over and over again to basically learn how to brew,” Suzette Grillot said. “That to me was a no-brainer, kind of as a starter beer, so I brewed it a lot to teach myself how to brew, and it’s still one of our staples. But, we created a pretty wide set of beers because again, our mission was inclusivity of beer.”
Equity’s beers are meant to offer something for everyone but brewing numerous styles quickly meant they outgrew their original tap space.
“We were running out of room on the taps. We had beers sitting back there that we couldn’t even get onto a tap,” Suzette Grillot said. “We started at 12 taps and we filled those 12 taps, and then we added the second row in order to have more offerings.”
More than just beer and bites
In addition to creating food and drinks to appeal to everyone, Suzette Grillot wants Equity to provide a truly inviting “third space” for everyone. Home is a person’s first space, work is their second space. A third space is a place outside of those that a person goes that is free from hierarchy, power dynamics and agendas, she explained.
“I felt in my work life that there’s been a lot of oppression. I’ve felt it, and I’ve seen it. And I’ve worked in a white, male-dominated industry, and food and beverage is also a white, male-dominated industry, books also white, maledominated industry, so that was just a big part of our interest was in trying to create safer spaces for people that aren’t white men,” Suzette Grillot said.
“So I wanted to create a comfortable space where people could come together, you know particularly, people from marginalized backgrounds — women, people of color, international folks, members of the LGBTQ community — could have a space where they could work, study, enjoy each other’s company.”
Part of that means that the brewery also includes a small food pantry and an
area where people can make donations of period products for those in need. Equity also has developed partnerships with local organizations through its Taps for Humanity collaboration. These brews support the efforts of those organizations, and 10% of draft sales for these beers go back to them.
“I think that community projects are really important, and so that’s one of the things that I think is really valuable about space like this,” Hannah Grillot said.
The current Taps for Humanity lineup includes Equity.Period Amber Ale with Period OKC, Liberation Lager with Foundation for Liberating Minds, Cerveza Mexicana with OKC Latina, Mutual Ale with Red Dirt Collective, No Strings Attached Experimental Beers with Norman Care-A-Vans and Lavender Lemonade Seltzer with With Love OKC.
Equity’s combination of physical space and people that are welcoming help it achieve the warmth the Grillots envisioned. Fostering improved equity in society, as the name suggests, is in the brand DNA, something Menja noticed even before she began to provide food and was asked to take an ownership stake in the company.
“One of the draws for me was finding a business that didn’t just call itself something and then not actually have any action behind it,” Menja said. “It’s really important to see businesses that even though you might not be the most profitable out there, but you’re still using your dollars to enact change in your community.”
Suzette Grillot said the hope is to go beyond just raising money and products, but providing education and awareness to food insecurity, the housing crisis, racial justice, education issues, reproductive rights, and other issues.
“As progressive people, we believe we should all have those rights as human beings, right? Our dream for humanity. We’re all humanists. We want to support the humans, and no matter who or what human you are,” she said. “That’s how we’re going to get through this life is we’re going to help each other.”