With an application to the village zoning board forthcoming, Mamaroneck’s mainstay beer destination may be cooking up something new; or more accurately, brewing.
According to Village Manager Richard Slingerland, Half Time Beverage, located at 139 Hoyt Ave., will look to repurpose part of its existing 20,000-square-foot storefront to accommodate both a brew pub where patrons could have a drink as well as a micro-brewery where they would be able to brew their own beer.
The plan, which Slingerland said he anticipates will be submitted to the village sometime this week after press time, wouldn’t expand the store’s existing footprint, but would require a zoning variance in what’s currently classified as a C-1 district, which does not allow for food and beverage.
For Alan Daniels, co-owner of Half Time, which also operates a store in Poughkeepsie, the addition would mark a logical step for its successful Mamaroneck outlet.
“Customers ask us all the time why don’t we brew our own beer,” Daniels said. “The village of Mamaroneck deserves their own brewery.”
Currently, Daniels added, though the current proposal wouldn’t feature food, the prospect of offering small bites to eat in addition to its expanded operations may also be in the store’s future.
If authorized, Half Time would join a growing wave of craft breweries—brewers that produce under a certain threshold of distribution—across the country; a trend that has exploded in volume in recent years.
According to the Brewers Association, a nonprofit trade organization which consists of 3,500 brewers from throughout the U.S., the number of regional craft breweries rose from 97 to 178, a nearly 32 percent increase, between 2012 to 2015 alone. Further, breweries overall saw an uptick of 15 percent nationwide over the same time period.
If seen to fruition, Half Time’s brewing venture wouldn’t be the village’s first taste of locally sourced craft alcohol, however.
Last year, residents saw the introduction of Good Shepherd distillery—run by Vincent and Carly Miata, a local husband and wife team—which offers a selection of small-batch brandy, vodka, and soon, whiskey.
According to Andrew Spatz, chairman of the village Industrial Area Committee, which is tasked with revitalizing a defunct manufacturing district adjacent to Mamaroneck’s Washingtonville neighborhood, Half Time’s plan would act as another puzzle piece in transforming the village economy for the future.
“I welcome something of this nature to the industrial area, and the peripheral areas,” said Spatz, regarding the potential brewery, which would fall just outside the geographic scope of the industrial area. “It only opens the door to further possibilities for economic longevity.”
Among the proposals by the industrial committee, which issued a report to the village Board of Trustees on its vision last year, would be an increased number of restaurants, galleries and high-end office spaces in the place of the area’s current population of historic warehouses.
However, an M-1 zoning classification in the industrial area currently excludes many of the businesses proposed by the committee, and as a result, changes to zoning code are being considered.
