does he have that perma-bloat to his face? Puffy and red?
I have two relatives who are both like that - they both down 6 to 18 beers a day, throughout the day... 2 in the morning, a few with lunch, then 4pm on just drinking nonstop. Both have red puffy face.
That's the weird thing. You can't smell it or see it on him. No bright nose. No puffy face or cheeks. The guy barely eats though...I think he subsides mostly on beer, then has a steak for dinner at a restaurant with business acquaintances.
There's always this pressure to drink. Lunch time, he drinks with customers/clients/investors...supper time he has to stay late to do the same. Gets home every night around 9-10pm. Has more drinks to take the edge off so he can sleep. Wakes up in the morning and downs a couple of beers before heading into work in the morning.
Honestly, you'd never know til you follow him around for a day or two. I did, and I was shocked. I asked him "is this really every day man", and he said yes. But he does a bit more on weekends.
He never drank as a kid, nor early in his career. But the life of the CEO comes with many expectations, and it's very difficult to say "no" to drinks when your distributors from Japan have just flown over and want to party a bit and relax. Then the next day, it's your VC partner and he wants a drink. Then the next day, its your raw material supplier from Budapest just flown in, and he wants to drink and talk business. How do you say "no" to all these guys? I guess he tried, then just gave in and gave up.
I never asked him if he wanted to quit. I know he wants to quit smoking, but I believe he has no intention of giving up the drink.
Boozing runs in my family strong. My parent's generation all hated it and never drank, because their parent's came home from the war and drank a lot. And their parents before them from WW1. So, we have the genes for it. But I've never been tempted strongly by it. Mind you, I enjoy it. But not as much as I used to when I was young. Now I get hunover too easy.