Networking Makes the Beer Taste That Much Better

Yesterday, Bryan from EcoGreenOffice most have hosted like his 30th Boulder Green Drinks but this time we all met up at Upslope Brewery just off of 36 on your way out of Boulder. It was a great venue with even better beer. The guys at Upslope have a great setup. I was up there at least once last summer and they had a band playing out back and it was just a great, casual time.

And about the event itself. Well, Bryan does a great job of promoting the event and the turn out certainly helps the local business hosting the event. I met some great folks: people from real estate, lawn maintenance, life coaches and some just finishing up MBA programs in renewables. The beer at Upslope is pure micro-brew so it goes down really easily and softens the edge, which makes networking that much easier…to a point. There’s probably a narrow line between being at your best, working the room, making conversation and when you should just sit outside in the sun and enjoy the spring weather. I can cross that line even without drinking as just a function of becoming self-conscious and realizing I’m the only one laughing at my own joke. But it was funny.

There seems to be a lot of movement in the “green field” but it’s hard to get a handle on where things are going. I read a lot about corporate social responsibility and that may be because of the BP incident; I also read a lot about renewables but I’ve been reading less about SMART grids and wonder why. If most of our energy is used to heat/cool are buildings then it seems like that’s where our attention should be. But conservation of resources is a much harder sell and perhaps harder to get people enthusiastic about it. I might suggest an Upslope Pale Ale to help their enthusiasm.