Utica brewery forges ahead following fire

CNY Business Journal (1996+), Jun 13, 2008 by Gregory, Traci

UTICA - Just weeks after a fire that destroyed much of the canning and packaging areas at the Matt Brewing Co., the company is already back at work brewing and kegging beer, and has plans in the works to continue bottling and canning with a little help.

"We're operating full speed and turning out the draught beer," company President Nicholas Matt told The Business Journal on June 10.

The May 29 fire, sparked by welding taking place inside the building, swept through the packaging building at the brewery, seriously damaging both the second and third floors of the building.

"We will not be able to can until we have redone that building," Matt says. And the plans for that building won't even be drafted until the extent of the fire damage has been fully assessed, he adds.

Right now, Matt says, the top priority is bringing brewing up to speed and restarting the bottling line.

"Our real focus is on when can we get back in production," he says. He hopes to have bottling back online by the end of this month.

In the meantime, the company's Saranac and Utica Club brews will be bottled and canned by High Falls Brewing Co, LLC in Rochester, Matt says. All the beer will be brewed in Utica and trucked to High Falls for packaging. It was important to keep the brewing in-house to maintain the consistency and quality of the beer, Matt adds.

The company was fortunate to have a "fair amount" of finished product that was not damaged by the fire, Man says. In addition to supplies held by wholesalers, there should be no shortage of Saranac, but inventory levels will be pretty low by the time the brewery is back up to speed, he adds.

"We're probably going to have to run a lot of beer in a short time," he says. That will keep the brewery's approximately 130 employees busy. Since the fire, the brewery laid off some employees, Matt says. He did not have specific numbers, but emphasized that any lay-offs are temporary. The company has tried to use its own employees for the clean-up work as much as possible. Employees with saved-up vacation time have been using that time until they can come back to work, Matt says.

Once production is back in swing, Matt says the company will figure out how to restore the canning operation. Right now, it's unclear how much of the building can be saved, he says. Some of the structural metal I-beams were bent from the extreme heat of the fire.

He expects the third floor, which bore the brunt of most of the fire damage, will have to be demolished. But he's hopeful the second floor can be salvaged and that the canning line can be set up there again once new equipment is purchased. Matt is hoping canning can restart in the next two to three months, but concedes it could be longer than that depending on what work needs to be done to the building.

The total financial impact of the fire, both from lost equipment and lost production, has yet to be determined, Matt says. The brewery is working with Adjusters International in Utica to determine the full extent of damages.

"It's going to be very interesting [to see] what the financial impact is," he says. The company is insured by Gilroy, Keman and Gilroy in New Hartford for the building and equipment as well as for business interruption.

During the past few weeks, Matt says he has been navigating a sea of issues, all with the goal of getting things up and running again as quickly as possible. The company did not, he says, have a disaster recovery plan in place.

"We're working through it to make the best out of a bad situation," he says.

The end result should be worth all the chaos now, Matt adds. "Frankly, I suspect we'll have a better facility because of this and a better organization."

He says the company was fortunate to find out who its true friends are. From High Falls Brewing to Gov. David Paterson, who toured the facility after the fire, Matt says he and his staff have been touched by the outpouring of help.

When you have something like this, you find out you have a lot of friends," he says.

Matt Brewing (www.saranac.com) produces about 3 million cases of beer and soda annually. The company generated sales of $30 million in 2005, according to a previous Central New York Business Journal article. The company's products are sold in 21 states including New Jersey, North Carolina, Georgia, Arizona, and Florida.