“You have to decide what your highest priorities are and have the courage—pleasantly,
smilingly, nonapologetically, to say ‘no’ to other things. And the way you do that
is by having a bigger ‘yes’ burning inside.”
-Stephen Covey, The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People
What we do here at Creature Comforts is brew (what we think to be) extraordinary beer. But ultimately, we hope you care just as much about why it is we do what we do. Since opening our doors, we’ve aspired to foster human connection through the service of others, leveraging our hands and our brands to make a material impact on the communities around us.
We’ve since discovered that the gravitational pull of any altruistic endeavor is, eventually, to do too much—to try to address too many needs, to add too many programs, thereby scattering the resources too thinly. The challenge is to remain focused. As Covey insists, to say ‘no’ often, but strategically.
So what is that bigger ‘yes’ burning inside Creature Comforts? Scroll down or explore this site to learn more—and we invite you to get involved when you’re ready.
We have two primary community impact programs—Get Comfortable and Get Artistic—and an emerging initiative called Brew For One.
Whereas Get Comfortable is about helping others survive, Get Artistic is about helping people thrive. These outcomes are two halves to a whole, and each necessary to foster a healthy community. Both employ (1) our time, (2) our space, and (3) our finances as program inputs, and both can be classified as community-based, not cause-based, strategies.
Brew For One, on the other hand, focuses on individual needs rather than systemic change. It is our desire to do for one what we wish we could do for everyone.
Here’s a snapshot of how all these reciprocal efforts fit together as a unified whole…
“We very often fail to think as carefully about helping others as we could, mistakenly believing that
applying data and rationality to a charitable endeavor robs the act of virtue.”
-William MacAskill, Doing Good Better
While there is an infinite list of worthy causes in our community, discomfort emerges whenever any need goes unmet. But rather than tether our corporate philanthropy to a specific charity, Get Comfortable concentrates the generosity of many around our city’s greatest needs. (But how?)
It is seldom that the public, private, and nonprofit sectors come together, compare notes, and execute a unified strategy. But we need one another: we need both the guidance of local leadership and generous businesses to propel social innovation. And we believe this coordination will lead to greater communication, fewer silos, stronger partnerships, less replication, and the alignment of resources to do the most pressing work.
Informed by our community’s priorities and needs-assessment data, and guided by our Advisory Council of local stakeholders, Get Comfortable channels the generosity of local businesses to the agencies doing the most to meet current demonstrable needs. (And, as of 2020, in DeKalb County as well.)
“Making residents happier is a few levels up the Maslowian hierarchy. But it makes sense that cities
want to shoot for it, since residents who are happier with their city are more likely
to be attached, and attached residents are more likely to get involved.”
-Melody Warnick, This is Where You Belong
Place attachment theory describes the emotional bond between a person and a place. This growing body of research—driven by the disciplines of anthropology, psychology, and sociology—ultimately suggests that the more an individual comes to love their city, the greater their eventual civic engagement.
While this phenomenon has many distinct inputs and outputs, a major predictor of place attachment is a thriving creative economy.
Using Clarke County’s 20-Year Action Agenda as our guide, Get Artistic is a community development program designed to foster place attachment by investing in our creative industries.
Creature Comforts is dedicated to better being through being curious. From our scientific brewing process to our wide-awake creative impulse to our small-town tenacity, Creature Comforts is driven by the promise that a curious mind leads to better living. We take inspiration from those who crave curiosity and share its reward. The thinkers, the inventors, the artists, the explorers. We feed our curious spirit through the pursuit of finely balanced artisanal beers, and our mission is to light that desire and follow its flame with our consumers. Creature Comforts craves curiosity.