Mark's recent blog, An Update On The New Brewery, received quite a bit of buzz this past week. So the folks at Brewbound.com had a chance to catch up with Mark on the recent developments with a potential brewery. Here is the full story from their site:
Narragansett Looks To Open Production Brewery
Narragansett, the historic New England beer company, is looking to open its first production brewery since 1983.
Currently, the lager and light offerings are made in Rochester, NY while the seasonals are made in Providence, RI and Pawcatuck, CT through other brewery operations.
"We are starting to get a little more serious about looking at different places," said President Mark Hellendrung. "Having a brewery will give us the opportunity to experiment even more and do more ’one-off’ selections as well as collaborations."
Hellendrung is looking primarily in Rhode Island and recently looked at the CJ Fox building in downtown Providence as one potential site.
"Once we get through the summer selling season, we will sit down and get more serious about it," he said. "We are gaining momentum and will hopefully bring this thing back which is great."
Having the brewery would allow Narragansett to produce their draft selections, but Hellendrung has not ruled out the possibility of investing in a 22 oz bottle filler for some of their "craft" selections such as the Bock and Porter.
The brewery is up 56% over Q1 compared to 2010 and has shipped more than 125,000 cases, giving them a nice head start on the fundraising efforts for the brewery.
"Being up almost 60% puts us within striking range to get serious about this thing," said Hellendrung. "If it happens, we should be up and running around this time next year."
More information about the potential brewery can be found on their blog post.