Post by The Tuck School of Business at Dartmouth

Nicole Carrier D’94, T’00 was working for IBM full-time when she started to explore the brewery space. When a property became available in North Hampton, N.H.—a 1860s farmhouse on 12 acres—she decided to go all in. “I thought to myself, ‘If I don’t jump into this and make it a success, I’m going to completely question myself for the rest of my life,” Carrier says. “I wanted to see our dream become a reality. And I didn’t want to kick myself when I was 80.” Today, Throwback Brewery LLC is an award-winning, female-owned brewery that operates a restaurant and farm. Carrier says that many of her skills from the corporate world came in handy when she became a small business owner. At IBM, she had been a product manager, where she did a lot of speaking, product development, marketing, pricing, and storytelling. “By the end of my career at IBM, I was on stage a lot and talking to the press and analysts, and all of those skills were completely transferrable. Instead of it being software, it was beer—a product that I feel a lot more passionate about,” Carrier says. “I’m not a billionaire, but I don’t need to be because I feel happy when I’m able to bring people together. That’s what gives my life meaning.”