Do businesses have social responsibilities? This is a question that has been argued for ages, and economist Milton Friedman would argue that they don’t. In his paper ‘The Social Responsibility of Business is to Increase its Profits,’ he states that the only goal of a business is to increase profits and shareholder value (ed. note: this might be the first time in the history of the world that an article about beer has started off referencing a dead economist). Friedman argues that spending company (shareholder) money on pet projects like charitable donations or community projects that don’t somehow increase shareholder value is an irresponsible misuse of funds.

In brewing, it could be argued that the only purpose of a brewery is to produce beer to sell for a profit to therein increase shareholder value (whether publicly or privately held). Despite this, many breweries have seemingly come down on the other side of this argument. Within the craft brewing community there are countless stories of community initiatives, environmental stewardship, and millions of dollars being donated to various charities. The craft brewing industry is a generous one, but do all these activities go against Friedman’s thesis? Could it be possible that by giving away money, beer, time, and resources these breweries are actually increasing their bottom lines?

As consumers, isn’t part of the craft beer appeal the warm, fuzzy feeling we get knowing we’re drinking a product that has a great story behind it? Whether we are told a story about wind power or cleaning up the ocean, we like drinking and buying beer that makes us feel good (aside from the obvious alcoholic properties.) In addition, we tend to have a little more pride for our hometown beers – they’re the breweries helping our communities. If breweries are involved in our communities, do we buy more of their beers?

Over the next few weeks I will be running a series of interviews with various breweries discussing their charitable causes, community initiatives and how supporting these has actually helped their businesses grow. I have a few surprises in store, including interviews with some of the largest, most well known craft breweries on this site to date. Stay tuned and check back often (or sign up for my RSS feed). The series starts tomorrow…