The Dream Job That I Want

[Kor37 9]

A Different Kind of Executive Officer

Scott Kerkmans beat out almost 8,000 other applicants to become what’s likely the country’s first chief beer officer.

By JULIE SLOANE

 

Job Title: Chief Beer Officer

 

Companies That Hire Them: To date, only Four Points by Sheraton, a hotel chain owned by Starwood Hotels & Resorts Worldwide, has a C.B.O., but other jobs have similar duties: a beverage manager at a hotel or restaurant chain, for example.

 

Number of Jobs in the U.S.: According to the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, there were about 157,000 food managers -- whose job often encompasses beverage management -- in 2006. A handful of self-described “beer sommeliers” have also recently emerged at bars and restaurants.

 

How to Find Out About Openings: In addition to the usual online job sites, WineandSpiritsJobs.com and ProBrewer.com both list industry jobs.

 

 

How Much You Can Earn: Kerkmans’ salary is undisclosed, but Ray Daniels, director of publications for the Brewers Association, guesses that a beverage manager might earn between $35,000 and $80,000 a year, depending on the size of the company and level of responsibility.

 

Useful Skills: A nuanced understanding of beer flavors and the brewing process is important for analyzing what to buy and explaining the differences among beers to customers.

 

Chief Beer Officer

 

While "chief beer officer" might sound like a jokey nickname for your football-watching buddy who's responsible for buying the suds every Sunday, there is at least one person in the country who has this actual job title and gets paid for it: Scott Kerkmans.

 

Four Points by Sheraton hired Kerkmans last winter as part of a publicity stunt -- the job opening was announced in a large ad splashed across the front page of the Wall Street Journal's Marketplace section. (In order to demonstrate its high-minded intent, the ad cautioned that "no lager louts need apply.")

 

Almost 8,000 people from more than 30 countries applied, with 7,000 passing the company's initial screening by correctly answering 20 beer-related questions such as "What makes a beer bitter -- the barley or the hops?" (Answer: hops.) The next round consisted of an essay and written application, with the remaining candidates being asked to produce a five-minute video of themselves discussing why they should be selected. Four Points posted the videos from four finalists on its website and asked the public to vote for a winner, and Kerkmans' video, in which he toured the brewery at Chicago’s Goose Island Beer Co., secured roughly half of the public’s 12,500 votes.

 

Kerkmans, a longtime beer aficionado, now finds himself in the enviable position of being required to make annual trips to Germany’s Oktoberfest, the Great American Beer Festival in Denver, and other notable beer conferences; receiving roughly a case of free beer each month to sample; and going on frequent V.I.P. tours of local breweries.

 

 

Hot Job Industries

The services sector is expected to add staff within banking/finance, retail, sales, information technology and healthcare, according to a recent survey by CareerBuilder.com and USA TODAY.

 

He’s also responsible for running Four Points’ Best Brews program, which educates bartenders in each of the chain’s 125 hotels to become beer ambassadors for the 16 brews -- half of them local or regional -- stocked by each hotel. Kerkmans helps make the beer selections, writes training materials for the bar staff, and travels to Four Points hotels across the country to host happy hours.

 

But the 28-year-old Kerkmans admits that his duties are far from onerous. "I get a paycheck, but it certainly pales in comparison with the perks," he says.

 

Beer has been a big part of Kerkmans' life since he received a home brewing set from his brother on his 21st birthday and made his first batch of beer. (Of that initial experiment, he now says “it was not something you would want to subject the general public to.”) Suitably inspired, he took a part-time job as a brewer at a brewpub in Albuquerque while finishing his bachelor’s degree in business at the University of New Mexico. "It slowly dawned on me that I could make a career out of beer," Kerkmans says.

 

After graduating, Kerkmans volunteered to do grunt work at several breweries in Salt Lake City so he could learn more about brewing, and he finally landed a job as a brewer for the Alaskan Brewing Co. in Juneau. While there, he passed a three-hour exam to become a certified beer judge, which allows him to officiate at contests, including those at the Great American Beer Festival. After returning to his hometown of Phoenix in 2005, Kerkmans worked as a sales rep for one of the country’s largest beer distributors and co-founded (with several friends) and wrote for Draft magazine, a publication about beer culture.

 

"It's my dream job," Kerkmans says of being C.B.O. "But then, I think it’s everyone’s dream job."

 

It doesn't pay that much but I would love this job!...

[Wishfire 2]

I'd shatter your knee-caps with a pool cue for this job.