Brooklyn Brewery denies reports it’s leaving Williamsburg

On Tuesday, it was reported that Brooklyn Brewery was considering moving one of its brewing operations from Williamsburg, and checking out Brooklyn Navy Yard and Industry City as possible new locations.

By Thursday, the brewery was denying it was leaving Williamsburg.

“You may have heard in the past couple days that we’re looking to leave Williamsburg. Let’s be clear: we’re not leaving,” the brewery said in a blog post titled “Reports of our Departure are Greatly Exaggerated.”

Eric Ottaway, the company’s chief operating officer and general manager, told Crain’s that the ability to renew their lease at their current location, at 79 North 11th Street, was “zero.” Owner Yoel Goldman put the 35,000-square-foot warehouse at 61-71 Wythe Avenue that houses the brewery and Brooklyn Bowl up for sale last year.

Ottaway told DNAinfo the company intends to renew its lease after it expires in nine years.

“We love Williamsburg. We’ve been here before Williamsburg was something anybody was even willing to come to,” Ottaway told DNAinfo. “Our intention is to stay here as long as we can.”

The post did acknowledge that the brewery is “location scouting.”

“When those projects are fully ready, we’ll unveil them, and you can bet we’ll be toasting them here in our Brooklyn home,” the post reads.

The brewery also has plans to relocate its current brewing upstate brewing plant in Utica to a $70 million, 200,000-square-foot facility on Staten Island, Crain’s reported. Staten Island Marine Development is developing the site on the island’s western shore. [DNAinfo] — Dusica Sue Malesevic