Quench Your Own Thirst Business Lessons Learned Over a Beer or Two

by Koch, Jim

• ISBN13: 9781250070500
• ISBN10: 1250070503
• Format: Hardcover
• Copyright: 2016-04-12
• Publisher: Flatiron Books

Summary

Founder of The Boston Beer Company, brewer of Samuel Adams Boston Lager, and a key catalyst of the American craft beer revolution, Jim Koch offers his unique perspective when it comes to business, beer, and turning your passion into a successful company or career.

In 1984, it looked like an unwinnable David and Goliath struggle: one guy against the mammoth American beer industry. When others scoffed at Jim Koch’s plan to leave his consulting job and start a brewery that would challenge American palates, he chose a nineteenth-century family recipe and launched Samuel Adams. Now one of America’s leading craft breweries, Samuel Adams has redefined the way Americans think about beer and helped spur a craft beer revolution.

In Quench Your Own Thirst, Koch offers unprecedented insights into the whirlwind ride from scrappy start-up to thriving public company. His innovative business model and refreshingly frank stories offer counterintuitive lessons that you can apply to business and to life.

Koch covers everything from finding your own Yoda to his theory on how a piece of string can teach you the most important lesson you’ll ever learn about business. He also has surprising advice on sales, marketing, hiring, and company culture. Koch’s anecdotes, quirky musings, and bits of wisdom go far beyond brewing. A fun, engaging guide for building a career or launching a successful business based on your passions, Quench Your Own Thirst is the key to the ultimate dream: being successful while doing what you love.

Author Biography

Jim Koch is the founder of The Boston Beer Company and brewer of Samuel Adams. He founded the company in 1984 using his great-great grandfather's recipe and set to the task of revolutionizing American beer. Samuel Adams Boston Lager has been an important catalyst in the American Craft Beer Revolution for more than thirty years, bringing full-flavored, award-winning beer to the American beer landscape. The Boston Beer Company has become one of the leading American craft breweries and now accounts for just over one percent of the U.S. beer market.

Table of Contents

Introduction
PART I: Mashing
1. Blow It Up
2. Turn Your Receiver On
3. Open Yourself to “Holy Shit”
4. Make It Better or Cheaper
5. Do the Math
6. Avoid “Smart” Investors
7. Look Hard for Talent. Then Look Again
8. The Best Marketing Plan Ever
9. Find Your Yoda
10. Sacred Cod Boston Lager?
11. The Difference Between Sex and Masturbation
PART II: Boiling And Cooling
12. String Theory
13. “I Make My Money When I Buy the Goods”
14. The Strength of the Weak
15. The Golden Rule of Selling
16. My Best Sales Call of All Time
17. You Can’t Hear with Someone Else’s Ears
18. You Don’t Climb a Mountain to Get to the Middle
19. Give Them Something to Talk About
20. When You’re Right, Push It
21. Take the Giant Turds in Stride
PART III: Fermenting
22. Grow Skinny
23. If You’re Not the Lead Dog, the Scenery Never Changes
24. Launch Your Long Shots
25. There’s No Pretending About Quality
26. The Most Expensive Education You’ll Ever Get
27. We Take Beer Seriously, but Not Ourselves
28. The CEO Flies Coach
29. The “Fuck You” Rule
30. Always Raise the Average
31. Make Your Public Offering Public
32. Learn to Take a Punch
PART IV: Maturation
33. Grow When You’re Not Growing
34. Endure the Endings
35. Mind Your Protection
36. If the Sun Is Shining, Look Out for an Avalanche
37. The Recall: Our Best Crisis Ever
38. Let Helga Do the Talking
PART V: Packaging
39. Practice Fingerspitzengefu¨hl
40. Stop Painting and Start Partnering
41. Welcome the Dude with the Gold-Painted Toenails
42. Quench Your Own Thirst
Acknowledgments
Jim’s Bookshelf
Notes
Index