The Search for God and Guinness

by Stephen Mansfield

  It was a change, then, but not just in the tone of the transition. It was a change from a generation that embodied the historic Guinness values. Benjamin, the new head of the firm, was a fine man and there would be many advances during his more than two decades at the helm. Guinness would begin to be brewed in Africa and Malaysia and would expand its markets beyond anything known before. The company would diversify into fields such as publishing and movies, restaurants and real estate, trucking, and even confections. It would also expand into a field that many a Guinness ancestor would have opposed: distilled spirits. First acquiring Arthur Bell & Sons, a distiller of premium whiskey, Guinness would go on to purchase other such firms and gain a reputation as a purveyor of alcohol in all its drinkable forms, rather than just a brewer of beer. It was a historic shift and one that would ultimately lead the company into mergers that meant its demise as an independent firm.

  The passing of the baton from Rupert to Benjamin signaled the end of an era of Guinness tradition. The men who had owned the company and then later chaired the board were men who drew their values from a deep family well. They knew how to brew beer, yes, but they also knew how to care for their employees, how to invest wealth for social good, and how to create corporate cultures that would change the course of nations. It was Rupert, after all—the one the family never expected to come to much— who took his £5 million wedding gift from his father and then went to live in the slums, becoming an advocate for the poor and downtrodden in a manner befitting his family heritage. He was an exceptional man, one shaped by compassion and adversity, and the legacy that he embodied did not die with the transition to Benjamin . . . but it did weaken and begin to fade.

  The Guinness Storehouse today

  In 1986, when Benjamin was not yet fifty, he decided to stand down from the chairmanship and to accept the title of president. The chairmanship thus passed from family hands for the first time in Guinness history. The truth was that Guinness had simply outgrown the Guinnesses. The acquisitions and the diversification had all made it too much. The rate of growth was beyond belief, almost beyond comprehension. In 1983, Guinness’s net assets were £250 million. Just four years later that number had quadrupled to more than £1 billion. Guinness had become one of the most powerful corporations in the world and the responsibilities of the chairman were too much for someone who had merely inherited it without having chosen it as a life’s call.

  The Guinness firm would continue to rise even after the Guinness family stepped from prominence. There would be scandals, of course, like the one that placed Ernest Saunders—Benjamin Guinness’s successor—in jail. And there would always be challenges, like the eventual recognition that Guinness had overreached in all of its diversification and needed to simplify. And always there would be the wonderful advertisements, like the wildly popular “Genius” ads, or the “The Man with the Guinness” commercials starring the ruggedly handsome Rutger Hauer, or even the delightful “Brilliant!” ads of later years. And then, of course, there was the dramatic merger with Grand Metropolitan in 1997 to create Diageo, the largest alcohol beverage company in the world. Now Diageo continues to extend the Guinness brand, taking it to new shores and new generations with each passing year.

  We should be thankful that they do. We should be grateful there is a magnificent Storehouse in Dublin that explains the genius of Guinness and keeps something of the heritage alive. Still, it is not Diageo’s job to extend the more spiritual version of that Guinness heritage. It is not their responsibility to speak of the faith of Arthur or the compassion of Edward Cecil and Dr. Lumsden or the self-sacrifice of Rupert and the Grattan line. No, that part of the heritage will only live when men absorb it from the Guinness story and embed it in fertile fields of their own.

  EPILOGUE:

  THE GUINNESS WAY

  The walk from the Guinness brewery at St. James’s Gate to Trinity College Dublin requires only fifteen minutes. It is one of the loveliest walks in Europe. A man turns down one of the many northbound lanes of the brewery, the smell of malt in his nostrils, and then moves east on Thomas Street. He passes through the Liberties, then, and toward the city center on one of the most famed market streets in Dublin. After but a few steps on High Street, he turns down Dame Street toward the college.

  On this historic avenue, named for ancient Dame’s Gate that adjoined the Church of St. Mary del Dame, our walker takes in some of the most inviting restaurants that Dublin has to offer. He will pass, too, the Bank of Ireland, the City Hall, and the side street leading to Dublin Castle, before approaching the gates to Trinity College. He cannot enter without passing the statue of Henry Grattan, the eighteenth-century Irish statesman who once wrote that brewing was “the natural nurse of the people and entitled to every encouragement, favor and exemption.” Guinnesses passing his statue must surely have tipped their hats to this patron time and again.

  Then, of course, there is Trinity College itself. It is a grand example of an Elizabethan university staking her claim to greatness in the modern world. Its forty-seven acres are adorned with cobblestone streets and buildings that have stood where they are for nearly five hundred years. But then there are the modern structures, shiny and high-tech, which prove that this is no sleepy, backward-looking institution.

  Looking up Dame Street from Trinity College, with the statue of Henry Grattan and the Bank of Ireland (with columns) on the right

  If we could make this fifteen-minute walk and travel not only a few miles but a few hundred years, we would find that one of the most treasured fields of study at Trinity was a topic we do not teach today, one that we have neglected to our own harm. It was called moral philosophy and it was a blend of history, theology, philosophy, and ethics. It was, in short, history writ large, a look at the past to gain the lessons that might be learned. Men studied history in this manner primarily to discern the ways of Providence and so acquire wisdom for their own age. Far from the ivory tower, abstracted-from-reality approach so prevalent in our modern universities, the study of earlier ages was then considered eminently practical and men expected to live differently for the time they spent in the far-off country of the past.

  It seems appropriate that this is the approach we should take to the Guinness story. Now that we have followed the broad outlines of this family’s journey through two and a half centuries of history, it seems that the story demands a moral philosophy approach, one like that which would have been taken at Trinity College all those centuries ago.

  Trinity College Dublin, established in 1592 by Queen Elizabeth I, is Ireland’s oldest university. Rupert Guinness made several important donations to Trinity. Pictured here is the Graduate Memorial Building

  What might we learn from the Guinness tale that we can emulate? What are the pillars of truth we can make our own? What are the distilled maxims of the Guinness experience that can lift us, too, beyond what we have known?

  Let us consider the Guinness Way.

  1. discern the ways of god for life and business.

  Harry Grattan Guinness had a favorite saying, one that he had borrowed from the wisdom of Prince Albert: “Gentlemen, find out the will of God for your day and generation, and then, as quickly as possible, get into line.”

  There is little question that much of the Guinness success and much of the Guinness impact on society came from living in light of this maxim of conduct. It began with a man’s individual life. It is not hard to imagine the first Arthur Guinness wondering, as we all do, about what his role in this life might be. He would consider his abilities, ponder what he sensed while in church, mull over what men like his father and his godfather the archbishop might have said about his future, and think deeply about what brought him pride and joy. In time, he would recognize his skills as a brewer and make it his life’s work.

  But there would be more. He would also wonder what God’s will for his life might be, beyond the brewing and the redemptive use of wealth. Why was he born in his time with its unique configuration of blessings
and plagues? And he would come to see what God was doing, how answering poverty and lifting men through a knowledge of God’s word and striving to end the bloody vanity of duels would all be the work his Savior might be about. And so he threw himself into these tasks. He started Sunday schools and gave generously to the poor and took a stand again the bloodshed that tainted his age.

  In all this, he was a success, and not just him alone but those who came after. We know from his own words that the second Arthur asked these questions of his life and even those who followed him and who were not as passionate about their faith nevertheless tried to understand their lives in terms of a purpose God might be fulfilling in their time. So this hope to know God’s will and fulfill it became a motive force in the Guinness line and it points a way to success for us as well.

  2. Think in terms of generations yet to come.

  Historians tell us that more than twenty-three generations were required to complete the glorious Canterbury Cathedral of England. We know that men sometimes worked all their lives on a portico or a vault or a series of pillars, understanding their labors as an offering to God. And when they were about to die, they often asked to be taken to the place they had worked in the cathedral. With their family gathered around them, they would pass their tools to their sons and commend the next generation to further progress on that tabernacle of God. Then, in peace, they would pass from this life.

  It is a vision that is easily lost, this idea of each generation playing a role in a larger purpose, but it has proven a pathway to success time and again. It is also part of the wisdom of the Guinness saga. Looking back over the centuries at St. James’s Gate, we can see the sons of wealthy men working beside day-wage laborers, learning the skills of brewing until they became the best they could be. Some of the Guinness men apprenticed for more years than they were allowed to lead, but this learning at the side of older men was always understood as the path to power.

  It is a lesson we ought to absorb and apply to our own work. We tend to think short term. We tend to expect each generation to start from the beginning and then rise on its own. But this is a modern way of thinking. In ages past, each generation was expected to launch the next, and great families of wealth and influence arose as a result. Perhaps this can be the meaning of Guinness for us, that we learn again to build for centuries rather than decades and that we do so selflessly, knowing that the measure of our lives is not determined at our death but rather in the lives and accomplishments of generations yet to come.

  3. Whatever else you do, do at least one thing very well.

  When Rupert Guinness served in the House of Lords, he hardly ever rose to speak. In fact, we know the exact words of the only speech he ever made. It seems that one day a fellow member, a peer, was complaining about all the signs he saw in the beautiful British countryside that boasted “Guinness is good for you.” After this went on for some time, the man ended his tirade. Finally, the nearly ninety-year-old Rupert rose and gave a memorable speech comprised of five simple words: “Guinness is good for you!” the eminent Lord Iveagh shouted. It was the shortest but perhaps among the most heartfelt speeches in the history of that venerable institution.

  Beer was what Rupert Guinness knew. Beer was what the Guinness fortune had been made from and beer was what the heads of the brewery ever labored to better produce. Yes, there were other interests among the Guinnesses and, yes, there were other pursuits, but for the brewing Guinnesses, making beer was the guiding passion of their business lives.

  It would be the folly of later generations to spread themselves too thin and to overdiversify until they nearly lost the excellence of their founding task. But in the early days, in the days that made the fortune and the brand, it was doing one thing well and linking all other pursuits to it that made Guinness among the greatest names in the world.

  It is a lesson we might reclaim today. There is certainly a place for diversification, but it should be attempted only after a solid base is built and only if that solid base is comprised of the one thing the man or the corporation does well. Then, if that foundation is broad enough and strong enough, perhaps it can support a number of pursuits. Yet always the one thing must come first and always the passion for excellence at that one thing must be nurtured. This is a Guinness key to success.

  4. Master the facts before you act.

  There is a wonderful quote from a time when the Guinness company was making a major decision about breaking into new markets. In an explanation of the company’s thinking, a manager wrote, “We followed our traditional policy of considering long and acting quickly.”

  It was the Guinness way. Once the facts were in and the data processed, once the context was understood and all variations considered, then action was taken and taken decisively. But only then. First, myths had to be exploded, lazy thinking exposed. Junior men had to be sent back for more research and the conventional wisdom challenged until it proved itself. It was an approach that undid impatient men, but the heads at Guinness didn’t care. Impatient men hadn’t built fortunes and brewed history-making beer. Impatient men were driven to mistakes by their eagerness to simply move on. No, impatient men had to be tempered, checked, and chastised, while wise men held off decisions until the knowledge they needed was complete.

  It is an approach that would serve us well today, when data passes itself off as information and speed is offered as a substitute to wise planning and strategies well designed. In an age in which knowledge increases nearly exponentially, it is easy to become lazy and move too fast. No, the wise man today, like the wise man in the first Arthur’s day, defies pressure in order to ponder and even to pray. And then he acts, when he knows who he is and what he should do, when he has anticipated the results and when his resources are rightly prepared. This is the decision making that leads to fortune and it may take greater courage than any other task a good leader must fulfill.

  5. Invest in those you would have invest in you.

  Edward Cecil, the wise business head who took Guinness to new heights, once said, “You cannot make money from people unless you are willing for people to make money from you.”

  This is nearly a reversal of business thinking today. The goal today seems to be to squeeze the worker until he can give no more. Rather than invest in him, rather than seek his good so he is better able to seek the good of his employer, we instead set up a tension between labor and management that is counterproductive to both.

  We seem to have forgotten the idea of a corporate destiny— that workers and owners, labor and management, prosper together or decline separately. We have forgotten that in a moral free market, social uplift best happens through the power of benevolent employment. It is in the world of work that men gain skills, have character modeled for them, gain a broader education, learn to lead, and are given the tools of advancements for their families.

  Guinness understood this. The company did not drain a man and then expect the church or the state to rebuild him again. They invested. They paid high wages, offered every type of education, provided medicine, sports, entertainment, and even a place to think, and assured every kind of financial safety net for those who served them well. They also built houses, sent sons to college, and lifted whole families to new economic heights. They did this because it was the right thing to do, yes, but also because it made their firm more successful than those who did not understand this vital kind of investment.

  The truth is as Edward Cecil proclaimed: we must invest in those who serve us if we expect them to serve well. It is one of the great pillars of the Guinness legacy and it is wisdom that we should reclaim, particularly in our modern economic world of tension and strife.

  These, then, are but a few of the maxims from the Guinness experience that promise to help us do well. They are the distilled truths of two and a half centuries of experience and the proven wisdom of one of the world’s great brands. And we, having read a bit of their story and pondered their meaning in time, would do well to learn their mora
l philosophy and to apply it to great, moral ventures of our own.

  ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

  As a visitor to the world of brewing and beer, I initially needed as much help with the Guinness story as I might have had I been writing about the planet Mars. Thankfully, I had good people to help me, men and women of faith and poetry and skill.

  It was Dr. George Grant who first introduced me to the idea that beer has a noble history and that great saints of old loved it, drank it, wrote about it, and celebrated it to the glory of God. I am grateful to him for this as I am for so many things, including that he tolerates my many demands for his time.

  I spent a fascinating morning at Blackstone’s Restaurant and Brewery in Nashville learning about brewing firsthand. Owner Stephanie Weins made me welcome, and Travis Hixon and Josh Garrett taught this novice much of what I needed to know about malt and wort and gravity and yeast. I absorbed their love of brewing just as I came to respect their skill and I am grateful for my hours in their world. Bobby Blazier made this connection for me, as he has so many others, and I love him for his passion for all things, including beer.

  Master Brewer Rob Higginbotham patiently spent hours teaching me his trade and since he is a poet as well as a craftsman, he gave me ways to lovingly communicate the art of beer I would never have otherwise known. I am grateful.

  A writer does his work as he holds the world at bay and then, when he is done, he reverses himself and yearns for affirmation and praise. Those who mix praise with loving criticism do him the most good, though, and I have had more than my fair share of friends skilled at this art. Jeff Pack, my raucous and loving fellow writer, gave wise counsel, as did Isaac Darnall, who not only offered a journalist’s feedback about what I have written but traveled to Ireland with me to take many of the marvelous photographs found in this book. His artistry and his teasing insistence that I love beer as he does have made my work better than it would have been.