Many months ago it dawned on me that the Craft Brewers Conference & BrewExpo America event would be in Indianapolis this year. It officially concluded on May Day, but the after-parties continue.
Admittedly I trolled the CBC on social media and felt great delight, both in seeing people I know (even if I haven’t seen many of them for a while), and moreover, knowing that Indianapolis had taken its turn.
Hosting the CBC is something we discussed often during my tenure on the Brewers of Indiana Guild (2009 – 2016), and I’m gratified to see the conference come to fruition. Indianapolis is a convention and big-ticket event kind of town; kudos to the planners.
When it came down to deciding whether I’d attend, which I probably should have given that I’m writing a book about beer, and Indianapolis is such a short drive from New Albany, I’ve seldom felt as conflicted. It was actually agonizing.
While my NABC buyout wasn’t final until 2018, I began the process of pulling away in 2015, so it has been ten years. You’ll get the full blow-by-blow narrative at an as yet undisclosed juncture in the “40 Years in Beer” narrative, but it will suffice to say that it was time for me to go, because my continued presence in the company I helped to build wasn’t sustainable any longer.
I never doubted the wisdom or timing of departure. When the moment comes, it comes, and by my own criteria (not anyone else’s), the point had arrived when I was powerless in my own milieu. Bank Street Brewhouse was almost entirely my idea, and although it was successful artistically, it wasn’t in terms of profit and loss. Someone had to take responsibility, and in essence, I fired myself.
Trust me; it’s true.
Doing so cost me dearly in terms of dollars and cents; NABC was to have been my retirement, and I cashed out for pennies on the dollar. I lost around $200,000 of my own and my family’s money, spent keeping the ship afloat.
I’ve made my peace with it, mostly. I had to. Otherwise, I’d still be drinking too much. Native Hoosier novelist Kurt Vonnegut has never been as quotable as right now.
“So it goes.”
In 2016 and 2017, I started trying to recover whatever self-identity I still possessed after more than two decades spent tying myself to the business of beer. The advent of Pints&union in 2018 helped in this process, at least in the beginning.
Someone else could be the front man, and I could play rhythm guitar and sing backing vocals; I never wanted to be the singer at NABC and did it because no one else would.
Pints&union was wonderful right up until it wasn’t. We seemed to limp through the pandemic somewhat intact, although in retrospect, I can see that this was when the ownership dynamic shifted. Common Haus, which followed, was like a much-hyped theatrical production on Broadway that opens to good reviews, then closes after a dozen performances.
The trauma was heavy, indeed.
Nothing was the same at Pints&union after that, and when my turn came to be scapegoated for the various and dully repetitive failures of management, at first it was a relief. But it didn’t occur to me at the outset that I’d also be tarred with the “ageism” brush. He went for the jugular, and that one hurt. It still does.
And, if I’m to be honest, being cashiered so cynically was embittering. I’ve tried mightily to use my writing as therapy to get past these feelings, and to an extent it has been effective — which brings me back to the CBC in Indianapolis. The risk in attending and relapsing was just too great.
My overtly flippant attitude toward attending the event went like this: Yes, this is likely as close to me geographically as the CBC will ever be, although Indy is Indy, and I can go there anytime, and wouldn’t it be better to experience the CBC somewhere else, like San Diego or Philadelphia, where we could make a trip out of it?
Fine, until the social media feeds reminded me that the beer biz was always about people, and I actually did miss many of the folks who were in Indianapolis for the show, as well as the involvement. Alas, my father taught me all too well, and expressing positive emotions isn’t among my strengths.
Since November of 2023, when I was compelled to walk the plank at Pints (today’s diary entry is NOT about forgiving the fellow who still owes me money), I’ve avoided that awful word “closure” as it pertains to my career in beer. Perhaps this has been a much larger error compared with CBC attendance. This needs to be put to rest.
Yes, I still write about beer, and the beer book is underway, and in May I’ll begin doing beer tastings/stand-up polemics at Harbor & Hops. Beer will remain a huge part of my life. But as far as being part of a pub or restaurant, putting together a beer program, and being in the center of things, well, that’s gone with the (idiot) wind.
Had I gone to Indianapolis for the CBC, there’d have been many reminders of the past. I might have gotten excited and emotional, and concluded that there’d be another opportunity. To be sure, there are no doubts in my mind that I can still do it, albeit with help from younger folks when it comes to lifting kegs and the like.
Still…closure.
I’m reminded of the periodic announcements wherein players in pro sports retire, when they last played three years ago, and just didn’t make it official. I get it. I’ve always said that one cannot make a comeback without first going away. I realize that my skill set as it pertains to beer is profoundly undervalued during the present post-literate age, and this is unlikely to change apart from niches and selective applications.
All of this suggests that I’ve retired from the business of beer, although of course beer consultations and chat are forever available to anyone who engages me.
Here goes: I…have…accepted being retired from the beer biz…excepting all the exceptions.
To local food and drink operators who offer beer to the public, I will repeat something I’ve said for years: You can do better. Be different. Build up quality brands, and be one of the few places, and maybe the only one, that sells them. Educate your peeps and push boundaries. You can set yourself apart and be a destination, or just continue slopping Michelob Ultra.
And Michelob Ultra does, in fact, suck.
