A Maryland resident is breaking barriers as an entrepreneur, becoming the first Black woman to solely own a tequila brand. Tiffany Hainesworth embarked on her venture after a car accident forced her to leave her career in criminal justice. 

“I was in a car accident, and, you know, things were bad for me, I wasn’t working. I wanted to do something different, something fun,” the TCapri Tequila founder told NBC Washington.

When she started her research in 2018, hoping to learn the tequila making process, the businesswoman found a distillery in Guadalajara, Mexico. She then worked in the field with the farmers, who harvested the agave plants, which would later produce tequila.

“It was important to me to pay homage to a product that I was producing,” Hainesworth said. “I didn’t want to just slap my name on a bottle and say I have a liquor brand.”

The tequila producer, who learned the value of hard work from her grandfather and aunts, now features her product on store shelves across Maryland. But the goal is to make her company a worldwide brand.

“It makes me feel like anything is possible for women, anything is possible for minorities,” Hainesworth said. “You just have to focus, put your mind to it and stay at it.”

Hainesworth was among the panelists, who were featured at an event organized by reality TV star Nene Leakes in 2019, The Miami Times reported. The Ladies of Success: All Girls Weekend event, which specifically catered to businesswomen, aimed to connect entrepreneurs with valuable resources and people who could help them grow. 

“We had a pillow talk where the women came in their pajamas. We talked about relationships, business and anything you can think of. We did this as opposed to sitting in a class and taking notes and basically not getting the chance to know each other,” Leakes said.

Leakes applauded Hainesworth and the rest of the panelists for their courage and dedication to their crafts.

“Basically these were women that you don’t know,” Leakes said. “They started at the very bottom and brought themselves up to million-dollar status. That takes a lot for a girl that just had an idea, but isn’t known or even educated.”

Before she narrowed her focus on tequila production, Hainesworth was baking mouth-watering treats. The owner of TCapri Gourmet Treats showed off her popular desserts in a 2018 segment for WJLA. One of the items featured on the segment was a bourbon butter bread pudding.

“Everybody has such a stigma on bread puddings, but my daughter’s Nana taught me how to bake and she taught me how to make bread puddings,” Hainesworth told WJLA.

Hainesworth, who also showed off her sweet potato cake and rum cake during the segment at the time, said most of her sweets are made with booze.