I want to grow one really bad, but I can't, because of work.
For the record, my wife, wants me to grow the beard, and is encouraging me to.
What I do, is time my beards with the weekends I'll be hunting. So, I'll let my beard go as long as I can (without getting the weird looks at the office) right before I go hunting, then I'll take like 4 days off work, and let it ride. I normally end up with, at best, a week's worth of beard. Not great, but it's as good as it gets.