How Africa News
Cyrenity Sips, a small-batch winery in Southeast Pennsylvania, was founded by Shakia Williams. This makes her the first black woman in Southeast Pennsylvania to own a winery. She began making wine as a pastime and now has one of the top artisan wines in the United States. She is quite proud to have joined the growing, but still tiny, group of blacks in the wine sector.
Her foray into the wine sector did not happen by chance. She worked at a winery in Virginia Beach before purchasing her own wine-making kit, which resulted in the creation of Cyrenity Sips. She also received excellent feedback from her family about her wines, prompting her to open her own.
“I felt in Pennsylvania, specifically Philadelphia, there wasn’t a niche for small-batch wineries,” “So, I decided to bring that here, and here we are,” Williams told Phl17.
The winery consists of a toasting room and a violet light-adorned lounge. What is more, customers can order a wine that consists of six samples from the 18 wine stocks.
“Our wines are carefully crafted to embody the essence of the particular grape varietal,” a statement on the company’s website said. “To give personification to the wines, each wine is meticulously named after relatives and friends.”
White chocolate wine, Cyan cotton candy wine, and La Peach wine are among the 18 wines available, all named after Shakia’s friends and family.
Black-owned wineries are rare in the wine market, but Shakia is proud that Cyrenity Sips is making a difference.
“Even though Black people [makeup] 0.1% in the winery industry out of 11,000 wineries,” Shakia explained. “I feel like showing diversity, [me] being a woman… I think it opens up people’s minds.”
