Conceptual rendering of the inside of Brew : The Museum of Beer .
a fellowship and was fortunate enough to be able to find an opportunity that allowed me to meet all of these goals .”
Sherwin spent two years living in southeast Asia as a writer , researcher and editor of various materials for politicians , including letters to the editor , letters to the U . N ., speeches , election commentary and more . Along with the Undersecretary of Education of the Philippines , he co-taught a university course on Law , Politics and Society . He visited 12 countries over two years and connected with a range of figures including the founders of democratic political parties in Cambodia and Hong Kong , independent newspaper editors in Myanmar and Malaysia , and heads of government agencies in Thailand and Taiwan . Even after all of these interactions , however , he came to feel that he could have the strongest impact in his hometown of Pittsburgh .
Upon his return to the U . S . in 2007 , Sherwin reached out to Linda Dickerson , a former board member of The Pittsburgh Foundation and a large-scale regional funder who Sherwin interned with while in college . “ Linda loves nothing more than to help young adults find ways to do good work for the City of Pittsburgh ,” says Sherwin . “ She has sat on the board of just about every nonprofit in the city and is a master fundraiser and networker .”
After studying the fundraising trade under Dickerson , Sherwin began taking on projects of his own . Soon he met Dr . Joseph McAllister , founder of The Autism Center at Children ’ s Hospital of Pittsburgh and the Advisory Board on Autism and Related Disorders ( ABOARD ), which today is known as Autism Connection of PA and has over 12,000 members . Additionally , McAllister ’ s private business , Services for Children with Autism and Their Families , was acquired by The Watson Institute and he was recruited to develop the Department of Psychological Services at Watson , where he served as the director from 2000 to 2013 . Familiar with founding and running programs in Pittsburgh that have been replicated internationally ,
McAllister was investigating the viability of creating a national beer museum in Pittsburgh . He engaged Sherwin initially to do economic impact research , and then to serve as the company ’ s first Director of Business Development . Recently , they added Denis Meinert to the mix of co-founders . Meinert currently serves as the CFO of Duolingo , a Pittsburgh-based online language instruction company that recently received a $ 45 million investment from Google at a valuation of $ 470 million . “ Denis has an excellent record of linking up with a company when operations are just getting started and he sees a market opportunity for growth and development ,” says Sherwin . “ Beyond Duolingo , he ’ s done this in a serial way with some of the strongest start-ups in Pittsburgh including 4moms , reCAPTCHA and Blue Belt Technologies .”
More recently , the trio started working with Andy Quinn , Director of Community Relations for Kennywood . Quinn was a co-owner of the company prior to its sale to Parques Reunidos in 2007 . Quinn has been assisting Brew : The Museum of Beer with government relations as it becomes increasingly necessary to engage world-class consultants and contractors who design and build destination attractions .
After three years of quiet research and development , PR for the museum began in September 2016 . The initial announcement was oriented toward a crowdfunding campaign that took place from October to December of 2016 , and was featured in a wide range of news outlets including Forbes Magazine , CBS , The Boston Herald and Men ’ s Journal , as well as many online publications including Yahoo !, UpGruv and VinePair . The campaign attracted the attention and interest of many across the nation and 377 supporters backed the idea on Indiegogo .
The aspirations for the museum include 50,000 sq . ft . overall . This is comparable to The Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in Cleveland that
Continued on next page ➢
Peters Township | February / March 2017 | icmags . com 67