The End - Truth from the Edge

 

  Every business appears viable right up until the point that it no longer is. Sure, some will send out clarion calls for help, try to encourage support from the local community, but for the most part, the pride and shame of what owning a business that is teetering on the brink is usually kept inside until the doors shut for the final time. 

  Now, I am not in possession of any secret information of what is happening inside Ontario Craft beer, I do however have an intimate understanding of owning a small, independent business and the struggles that can entail. I see patterns and hear things, watching from close and afar, I know the desperation some folks are feeling, when everyday seems like another step toward failure. You cringe every time the phone rings or another letter arrives screaming out final notice. This isn't a lesson anyone needs to learn from experience, but if you've been through it, you know just how gut wrenching it can be.

  When you own a public facing business, especially one like a brewery or restaurant, you are often out there in front of the house or online as the face and voice of your place. Your identity quickly becomes intertwined with that of your dream and your work and with the advent of social media in the last 20 years, it has become increasingly more public with more interest hopefully driving higher sales. The smaller the footprint, the larger your presence will be felt in terms of your connection to the public, they see you as the point of contact and reference you by name as though you are everything. And, in a way, you are. It feels like everything is you.

  Running a small business has always been driven by people who have a vision and make things happen to realize that dream. They clear hurdles, naysayers and self doubt to arrive at opening day, filled with joy and pride, a tired happiness that sees the doors open for the first time. In the case of beer, it is even larger as people truly do want to support local, sometimes at the expense of quality, they are more forgiving when the owner is right at the taps, sharing a taste of what their imagination has given to reality. But even the best made beer doesn't ensure survival, it is at the very heart of everything we know and taste, but there are different forces far outside of anyone's control are often the most destructive and crushing.

  There was a time, early on in my ultimately futile attempt to right the ship that was my life, that I thought I could pull out of the downward spiral by sheer force of will. By working longer hours, harder and with less return I could swing the financial home run I needed to stay open. I watched the numbers tell me the opposite, but I still found a way to convince myself I was just a good month away from solving the mounting list of debts and problems points piling up. But more importantly, it was with a good amount of fear that I would fail in front of the world and then who would I be. That fear drove my descent into a terrible mental health crisis that I have documented over the last 8 years here and on other platforms. There comes a moment when you finally understand that there is no one coming to save you, every mistake you made or success you created did not matter because the end and the truth are staring right back at you in the mirror. It can feel hopeless and the darkness of ending it all feels very real, I went down some very somber, disturbing roads and held on for dear life to the small things I could keep on living for.

  As for the current situation that has seen a slow but gradual drip of brewery closures, mergers and acquisitions for the beer scene here in Ontario, so much of that has been driven by some of the factors that we can all identify with if we imagine ourselves in those positions. The pandemic loans are playing a part to be sure, the CEBA program was designed to help keep businesses afloat during lockdowns and despite some forgiveness and extensions, it is proving to be difficult for many places to find a way to pay them back or get extended credit to float them by. Dry January and February continue to do no good for breweries, driving down sales in the two slowest months of the year, albeit with a good cause in mind, just a terrible time to do it. The changing economic landscape no doubt has been a large part of what is driving up inflation, rent and utilities continue to rise and the cost of goods rides that wave right into your profit and loss columns. It is more than just one thing happening that is causing this foreboding feeling, there was easy money for so long and we didn't think that would ever stop. Who wants to look for darkness when all you want to see is light. There are places I am sure who have over extended themselves because they saw a path forward through growth and in the end it wasn't enough. I know that feeling myself, having taken on more debt to renovate the business that I hoped would help, doing much of the work myself and knowing deep down that I was only chasing a whisper to a dream.

  There are a myriad of reasons why businesses succeed or fail and when we see someone have to finally give up that dream, we pass on our condolences and move onto the next beer. But I can tell you, those of us who have had to hear those goodbyes internalize that loss. We feel it in our guts, we lie awake at night even after it's all over, wondering what we could have done differently or better to make everything work. We carry an invisible weight that often crushes our identity and we lose a bit of ourselves every day after. I went to some very dark places, lost a lot of people I called friends (who I miss terribly every day), because I could not see myself worthy of any good in my life, I was tied to that business and its failure was a personal one that lives with me to this day. 

  It has taken me more than a decade to get to this point where I finally feel that tether to the past letting me go. I'm sure if I could do it all over again, I would have sought professional help for my mental health as everything fell apart around me. I know it is possible to bounce back, to rebuild your life and let go of that dream, but in the very real and raw time of the moment it all stops, you feel more alone than you ever had. I encourage anyone who is in this struggle right now to try and reach out to those around you who love you. They will be the strength you may need. Do not associate a business failure with some kind of character flaw or internal moral debt. Seek out someone to talk to about this very real loss, it is something you will grieve and therapy isn't a bad word, despite the macho mentality of going it alone. I know, it almost killed me in the end to keep it all inside. There is life to be lived outside the walls you've built up to try and keep it all together.

  I didn't know what today was going to bring, I had some ideas about what I wanted to write about. Happy, silly things like beer fridges, nostalgic beers and some other stuff, but I felt this was a time to talk about my own difficult experience so maybe I could reach someone out there who is feeling the weight of the world coming down on them to tell them there is a future and you deserve to be in it. Life isn't work, you are more than what you tried to make come true. Craft beer has been an incredible influence on my life in the last 9 years, but there are serious problems everywhere in the industry and the honest truth is that 2024 is going to be a difficult year for some people we have come to know and love. Support your favourite breweries and other local businesses when you are able.

  We are all in this together.

  All my love for the folks who keep on believin'...long after the music stops. 

Polk

January 29th, 2024

Friday leaving Work (Part 8)

"I'll see you again..."
  As soon as he said those words, he knew he was either lying or hoping and he couldn't figure out which he was wishing for more. Leaving was never easy and for a man who craved routine inside of what appeared to be a chaotic existence, walking away from the normalcy of regular life into the unknown was strange, dangerous and thrilling all at the same time. Drunk or sober, he was never about taking chances and he lingered as he watched this one slip into the oblivion of  what could have been once again.  It wasn't that he wanted to pour his heart out, but he should have at least acknowledged what she had meant to him after all they had been through. Faded images of times gone by filled his mind as he drove away, headed home to an empty apartment save his cat and a fridge full of beer to soothe his empty heart. A little maudlin, but given his penchant for screwing up relationships, perhaps the most apt description of this day.
  She had been a fixture in his daily routine for as long as his faulty memory could allow him to remember. While it had only been a few years, his fuzzy recollection was sure it felt like forever. That smile etched in his brain like a fire brand on his skin and the lilt of her voice lingered long after she said her last words to him that final day, her composure a sure sign he would never see her again in his mind.
  Their relationship had always been above board but he felt more could have been found if he wasn't such a damn coward. They went deep many a night at that chain pub around the corner from work and even though it remained unspoken, they both felt that there were moments left in the past where it could have been so much more. Knee deep into their 5th pitcher of Coors Banquet and trading off the buying of shots of cheap whiskey, they came close but never could make it over the mutual fear of ruining something that meant so much to their day to day existence.
  Driving home, he paused at every stop sign and red light, trying to work up the courage to turn his old truck around and go back to lay it all out for her. Did he think she would agree and run to him with open arms or was that delusion even too much for his cynical mind.  But still he drove slower than usual as he wondered if a grand gesture was indeed what was warranted to turn his rapidly diminishing life around.
  Pulling into the municipal lot his building shared with the surrounding businesses downtown, he made sure his pass was visible on the dash lest he get a ticket he would be too lazy to fight and would end up costing him more than a few pints around the corner. The contents of his now empty desk were in the backseat and while it was probably a good idea to take it all upstairs or even more appropriately to the nearby dumpster, he felt leaving it there meant she existed for a little while longer in his life.
  Many nights he had chosen poorly and this was to be yet another nail in his long and lonely coffin to self immolation at the tap handles. The not so newish brewpub beckoned and as the Friday night traffic swirled beside him, he pushed open the doors and was met with the familiar face of the people who poured happiness by the glass and always had a little extra for the man who had so little.
Greetings and the usual social graces were exchanged and as he headed to his usual corner booth to wallow in what may be yet another poor decision, he noticed a familiar hand raising a pint and realised that she was here, waiting and with that, everything changed...

5 Years Ago - Rock Bottom and A Way Out

"I just hope you don't end up homeless."
  Actual words said to me 5 years ago by a CRA agent while my business and personal life were crumbling down around me. Said with a serious tone and some malice, she was scathing in attacking my undeniable failure and her hope for my own personal downfall. The funny part to me then was that I thought 'Why would I be homeless? I have a family that loves me and I am pretty sure someone would take me in if I truly lost everything.' I look back at her words now and chuckle because she wanted me scared and I was so lost in the haze of having been embarrassed publicly by my failing and subjecting myself to being treated like a giant loser for doing so, fear was taking a backseat to numbness.
  I took the only lifeline I could see and used (what I thought) was the one skill I had, being a low paid fry cook who wasn't worthy of any happiness, let alone hope. At the very depths of my despair, I heard her words ringing in my ears as I struggled working 70 hours a week just to keep a roof over our heads and food on the table. I was turning 40 in less than a year and I had just lost everything I had worked over a decade to build, life was bleak, dark and empty. Clinging to the only route I had out of this self created mess was getting shitty drunk on cheap beer every night when I got home around midnight, rarely having a day off and even then, spending it cramming Brava light one after the other until the fear was quieted. The absolute of my end was that I would never again be happy, let alone ambitious enough to try to make life better...deeper I went.
  The treatment of a failure who has to subject himself to the reminder of his downfall was in my face every day and I was constantly put down and forced to accept that I was only worthy because I could stand in place for 16 hours a day and hate myself for everything I had become. It was wearing me down, minute by minute I was losing parts of my soul, my sanity and my life. And then the break came that gave me a glimmer of hope for something better. The last thing I expected was to reach rock bottom and find a hand come out to help me up, but when it came I felt the first breathe of hope enter my lungs in months.
  A friend of Kat's had a family cottage and with our constant struggle to even live, she offered it to us for a few days in August of 2013, gratis, no strings attached and we jumped at it. Money would be tight in the coming weeks if we went, but it turned out that 4 days at somewhere not around here was not only necessary, it literally turned out to be the place that saved my life. 
  I had been intermittently applying to other jobs, not with much hope given my many years of self employment and low self worth, but the spark was there, I just had to believe. While at work on my last day before we left for our mini vacation, I received a call from a prospective employer and actually did the phone interview just before my long shift started...was this the one?
 Later that day, I received another call asking if I could come in for an interview that week and even with the 45 minute drive from the cottage, something told me to take the chance. I was nervous and with almost no experience in what to say or do on a job interview, I went in with the best thing I could bring, my open and honest way of speaking the simple truths of life. I talked of my skills in building teams, helping people realise their potential and of course, my dream of starting over and growing with an established and well known company that had a bright future. I was done trying to hold on to who I was before and it must have come through because even before I left the parking lot after the interview, I got another call to come back the next day for a 2nd one. Driving back to the cottage, I could feel a weight coming off my shoulders, my head clearing. We celebrated a bit that night and the next day felt like a step out of the grave, a sliver of hope. I once again went in with a positive demeanour and felt good as I left to return to the oddest vacation I'd ever had. We heard nothing on our final day at the cottage and tried to just enjoy our brief respite from the darkness that awaited us at home. It was a quiet time, my mind racing but unable to process if there actually was a way up and out from the hell I had created, Kat sensed it and didn't push too hard. We both were hoping against all odds that something, anything would swing our way and gives us one more shot at a life without the weight of the past dragging it down.
  Coming back to the house and hearing my phone ring that Friday before I headed back into work was like a choir singing to my heart. An offer was made and while I was staring a 40 hour work weekend, I was never happier. Accepting and planning to say goodbye to the people who had helped keep my head above water was all I could think of as I worked away the next few days, waiting to sign the papers before handing in my resignation. I felt light and happy and when I finally put my signature on the line and shook my new employer's hand, it truly gave me a second shot at a life I thought long gone. My immediate superior at my then job had become a good friend and when I told him I had found a new job, he was elated for me. He had watched me slowly drowning and knew my only way up was out. Good bye came fast and hard that week and while I was grateful that they had taken me in and given me a space, I knew I didn't belong there anymore. New feelings of having some worth could be felt as I drove home after my last late night shift as a fry cook and the new day and job were starting only hours later. I was definitely a little scared at starting over, sad to say good bye to something I had been involved with since my early 20's and a little choked up because I still couldn't believe anything had gone my way.
  The road to my recovery from those dark days was far from over, many valleys came before the sun broke through darkness and life still had a lot to teach me about humility and patience. But that all was at least in front of me, hope had come back to my life and that alone made this the first step in becoming a better man, one day at a time.
  4 years later and I can still feel those butterflies, my world is brighter and the future keeps showing me promise of amazing things to come. I'd love to meet that woman again just so I could tell her that despite her assurances of my imminent destruction, I'm not only surviving, I am living a life with purpose and love.
  Keep on keeping on and the world may just give you what you need when you least expect it. The new chapter begins when you finally open you heart to what can be. I did and now there is no limit to where I can go. Trust me, I've been there.


Polk