Love it or hate it. Accept it or reject it. Live it or….let it die.
I love the relatability of having our primary beer central to everyone’s life. Life = Death.
Iron Horse Brewery is dead. April 20, 2037.
Not a prediction—this is a pre-mortem.
If you already know what a pre-mortem is, skip ahead. For the rest of you: a pre-mortem is a way of imagining the future and asking, “What went wrong?” It assumes the patient—in this case, Iron Horse Brewery—has already died, and we’re dissecting the cause. (Look it up: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pre-mortem.)
What started as a flippant idea during a conversation with Riley about post mortems, turned into something deeper. After all, as the saying goes, “There are no new ideas under the sun—just new suns.” Dang, Riley, I guess we don’t have any new ideas either.
So, what kills Iron Horse Brewery over the next 12 years? What malignancy takes root that we just can’t heal?
Here’s my prediction: we succumb to fear.
Paralyzed by the risk of making the wrong move, we make no moves at all, clinging to the past and forgetting to shape the future we’re meant to live. Like so many, we chase what we’re running from.
Or maybe something external takes us out—like an environmental catastrophe wiping out malt crops. Beer dies because the costs skyrocket, and food takes priority. Life without beer? Noooooo!
What do you see killing Iron Horse Brewery? I’m in love with the wisdom of the many so I ask you, what do you see when you imagine our organizational death in a dozen years? Be provocative, be genuine, be imaginative, be specific. If you give my favorite response I will get on a zoom call with you and irritate you with questions and reflections for 42 minutes. You can invite your friends and family too. XOXO
