Night Shift moving ‘majority’ of beer production out of Everett brewery

beer

“This is a huge threat to our business, but the business itself is not dissolving,” the company said of a CO2 shortage.

Handout, File

Night Shift Brewing announced Wednesday it is moving the “majority” of its beer production out of its Everett brewery and instead will have two other New England breweries brew most of its beer through contract relationships.

In social media posts, the company said a carbon dioxide shortage, as well as longtime limitations at the Everett building, which will remain open, were the root causes of the shift; Framingham-based Jack’s Abby and Isle Brewers Guild in Pawtucket, Rhode Island, are the breweries picking up their production. As a result of the move, Night Shift said they “won’t likely have jobs for many” on the company’s 12-person production team come Oct. 1, calling it “one of the most heartbreaking circumstances to ever face our business.”

“This is a huge threat to our business,” Night Shift said, seemingly referencing the CO2 shortage, “but the business itself is not dissolving.”

The company said it learned last week that its CO2 supply had been cut “for the foreseeable future, possibly more than a year until we get more.”

“Seems like this will be an issue that impacts a lot of local breweries, so we’re probably one of many breweries facing this new threat to our business,” they said.

But Night Shift also referenced long-standing issues in Everett:

A few years ago, it became clear to us that we’d outgrown our Everett production facility. For a brewery of our size, the space poses many challenges and limitations, including limited storage capacity, short ceiling heights, awkward layouts, and lack of proper loading bays. Our plan was to build a larger facility in Philly, but then COVID-19 hit, and we had to abandon it.

Since then, we made enormous investments in our Everett facility to try and make it more efficient. Despite all the various ways we’ve tried to solve it, production in Everett has remained more inefficient than our business can sustain. Our plan had been to continue problem solving, but this latest CO2 issue has basically thrown a huge wrench into any of those plans – threatening even immediate production (eg we might not be able to finish canning today).

Night Shift stressed all of its taprooms and beer gardens will remain open.

“Everett brewing will continue, but more as an R&D facility with a smaller crew,” the company said.

The brewery, known for its owl logo, closed by dispelling “a few false rumors we’ve already heard circulating”:

– We are not closing any of our taprooms or beer gardens

– We don’t expect any major disruptions to our beer supply, thanks to our relationships with Jack’s Abby and IBG

– We don’t expect any negative impact on the quality or experience of our beer

– These decisions do not impact the jobs of any employees or departments at our company besides production, who are in a terribly unfortunate position given the situation at hand.

– Nobody on our production team has been fired. Everyone has jobs through at least October 1, some potentially longer. Anyone who ultimately does lose their job will also be given a severance package.

– Long-term, assuming we have CO2, we will continue to brew beer in Everett, just at a smaller scale.

– This is a huge threat to our business, but the business itself is not dissolving.

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