Sarah Perez is confidently stepping onto the national stage, but her goal isn’t to stay there—it’s to cede that space to others.
She wants to use her leadership roles to create opportunities for other people from groups underrepresented in beer, particularly Black women. That’s the purpose of Lifting Lucy, a campaign Perez launched this year with Ashlie Randolph, co-founder of Mo’ Betta Brews, and Tranice Watts, co-owner of Patuxent Brewing Co., to assist women of color in offsetting expenses associated with attending beer industry conferences and professional events.
“I’m here to create more space for everyone else,” Perez says.
Perez, head brewer at Denali Brewing Company in Talkeetna, Alaska, has racked up other accomplishments over the last two years: In 2020, she founded the Alaska chapter of the Pink Boots Society (no easy feat in a state twice the size of Texas that’s home to fewer than 50 breweries). In 2021, she completed the intensive Concise Course in Brewing Technology at the Siebel Institute of Technology as the recipient of the Glen Hay Falconer Foundation Brewing Scholarship. She also presented at the Craft Brewers Conference and hosted a virtual symposium through the Anchorage Museum titled “Extra Tough Beers: A Panel Discussion With Female Brewers of Alaska.”
Perez is also a mother of five and brews (with outdoor fermenters) in a part of the country that recently reached -25° F overnight. Anyone else would call her tough, but Perez admits to her vulnerability.
“I can take criticism all day long, but dang it, if I fail at something I’ve put my heart and soul into, it eats at me,” she says. “That’s because I grew up very poor, very challenged. I am the only Black person in my family … so I was subjected to different levels of scrutiny—like, I have to do better because I’m Black. I can’t fail, because if I fail, I’m never going to get another chance.”
She doesn’t want other Black women in beer to feel that scrutiny, and she won’t stop working until it’s a reality. “I see the ability to make improvements, and I can’t stop until I see more.”
Words,Kate Bernot