About

The best conversations start with one simple question.

I’m Jonathan Cooper. I made Thinking & Drinking to get people around a table, phones down, talking about something other than work, the weather or politics.

Jonathan Cooper, creator of Thinking & Drinking, holding a very large mug of beer at a bar in Mexico City
Jonathan in Mexico City, researching.
How it started

A journalist, a work trip and a few hundred questions.

In 2015 I was a journalist at one of the country’s largest newspaper companies. After a work trip spent trading stories with co-workers, I realized that some of the best conversations start with just one simple question. When I got home, I wrote out a few hundred of them.

The beer was already there. I’d been a fan of craft beer and local breweries for years, and whenever I traveled I went exploring: not just the beer, but the breweries and the stories behind them. Breweries are gathering places. They’re community hubs, where people come together to share and celebrate.

And craft beer is an art form. It’s more than what’s in the bottle, can or glass. The creativity of the recipes, the names and the designs: there are so many stories to tell.

So every question got a brewery. I called, emailed and stopped in to pitch the idea. All a brewery had to do was fill out a form and upload a picture of its beer. More than 310 said yes.

Thinking & Drinking launched in 2015, created with co-founder Nikki Cooper.

A game of self-discovery or self-destruction

One card. One whole night.

What was your first concert?

One customer bought the game to play with his girlfriend and his mother, on the night the two of them were meeting for the first time. That was the only card they flipped. He learned that his mom had seen Led Zeppelin and Pink Floyd, a conversation the two of them had never had. They spent the whole night sharing stories, laughing and listening to music.

You never know what you’re going to find out about your friends, your family, the other players or yourself.

So far

What we’ve built.

310+

Breweries, asked one at a time.

Every card features a real craft brewery and one of its beers. See the full list.

50 + 1

Every state, plus D.C.

From some of the biggest names in craft beer to small-town start-ups.

Live

Played at festivals.

I take the game to beer festivals and play it live with whoever walks up. It’s a great time.

A half-full pint glass. Pessimist says it’s half empty, optimist says it’s half full, craft beer lover says it’s time to order another.
Non-negotiable

What we won’t do.

  • It will never be an app.

    People have asked. It’s a non-starter. The goal is to get people together and get them to put down their phones.

  • Nobody is told to drink.

    No forfeits and no chugging. The beer is there to be enjoyed, and the questions do the work.

  • Breweries never pay to be on a card.

    Being featured is free. It always has been.

Pull up a chair.

If you host the kind of nights where nobody checks their phone, this game was made for your table.

Get the Game

Brew beer? Get your brewery in the deck.