Idle Hands Craft Ales, a small Boston-area microbrewery that got its start on a 1 ½ barrel nano-brewing system in 2011, today announced it has been forced to vacate its facility in Everett, MA.
Idle Hands’ current space sits just blocks from the proposed site of a new $1.3 billion Wynn Everett resort and casino. In order to make room for a construction access road, Idle Hands and a handful of small businesses must be out by June 30.
“While we are saddened our need to move is happening this quickly, we also always knew our home on Charlton Street would not be our last,” founder and owner Chris Tkach said in a press statement.
The company, which also owns and produces the Enlightenment Ales line of beers, was initially informed in February, Tkach said. The company was already close to signing a lease for a new, larger location when it received the eviction notice.
“It’s within a couple miles of where we are located right now,” he told Brewbound. “I am confident that we could have something signed by the end of the month.”
The new, larger space would enable Idle Hands to upgrade everything from brewing equipment to parking availability and it could be operational as early as December, Tkach said, although it will require a slowdown in production in revenue during the move.
The company plans to invest upwards of $700,000 to triple the size of its brewhouse – growing from 5 barrels to 15 barrels – and add larger 30-barrel fermentation vessels. Output could double to more than 1,000 barrels during the company’s first 12 months in the new space, Tkach said.
“I would have much rather had this happen on our own timeline,” he said. “It is just not that easy to find something, in the Boston area, that can accommodate the infrastructure a brewery requires.”
Idle Hands had been on pace to brew more than 500 barrels in 2015 prior to the eviction.
In the interim, the company plans to shift production to fellow Everett-based craft brewery Night Shift Brewing. It plans to take a more “streamlined approach” with production, creating new seasonal beers with hop-forward profiles and offerings the company believes “will move fast.”
As a result, all of Idle Hands’ production will shift into draft packages as the company attempts to “maintain a presence in the Boston market.”
The company’s taproom will remain open until Saturday, June 27.