AURORA — City officials have been pleased with the success of microbreweries in terms of jobs and revenue, and that pleasure is only growing as the city’s first brewpub continues to expand.
Dry Dock Brewing Company now has a tasting room in the northeast part of the city.
“This expansion is great for the city,” said Aurora retail specialist Tim Gonerka. “I love the fact that they decided to make their production facility a retail area, as well, because it helps the overall market as we’re growing that (type of) business throughout the city.”
The Canoe Room is an approximately 2,500 square-foot bar space in the front portion of Dry Dock’s 30,000 square-foot production warehouse at 2801 Tower Road.
That location is the company’s “North Dock” and is on the opposite end of the city from South Dock, the original taproom, at 15120 E. Hampden Ave.
Gonerka said that in general, microbreweries in the metro area range from about $400,000 to $1 million a year in total sales, which can rake in significant tax revenue. He said the success of Dry Dock has inspired a wave of microbreweries opening in Aurora.
“Two years ago, I think we had Dry Dock and that was it,” Gonerka said. “Now we have five to seven in the Aurora area, with more coming.”
He said the Stanley Aviation building redevelopment will have at least one new microbrewery,and the city hopes to have more along Colfax Avenue before reaching into existing, high-density retail areas.
When the owners of Dry Dock opened their $4.5 million production facility in 2013, they began packaging eight of their recipes for Colorado distribution only. At the Canoe Room, guests can taste those brews, like the apricot blonde, amber ale, barrel-aged imperial stout, vanilla porter and hefeweizen.
“I like it a lot. It’s smaller and more intimate than the other location, and … closer to where I live,” said Brighton resident Brian Green, 42. Green has been a regular at South Dock since 2006, a year after it opened. “It reminds me of what microbreweries were like 20 years ago when they were all small tasting rooms.”
Part of the tasting room is set up inside the warehouse, fenced in with unused brewing barrels.
“We did that so that people can see the actual production facility and see the canning line work,” said Dry Dock co-owner Kevin Delange. “There are tables and chairs in there so they can actually see the beer being made and packaged.”
The manufacturing warehouse has nine fermenting tanks that brew about 11 batches of beer each week — that’s 40 barrels per batch, (each barrel holds 31 gallons of beer). Delange said the North Dock produces 15,000 cans every day and sends them off to local liquor stores and restaurants in Colorado exclusively. Since January 2013, North Dock has sent out 4 million cans.
“Because we’re making really large batches at the manufacturing warehouse, we only have our packaged brews available in the tasting room,” Delange said. “There’s also an imperial pumpkin and saison there.”
And Dry Dock already has plans to expand again. The North Dock is situated on 6 acres of land,and the owners hope to open a massive outdoor beer garden, complete with an entertainment lawn and park space in the next few years.
“Dry Dock is one of our star companies, so whatever we can do to help them continue to expand their business will be good for the city,” Gonerka said. “One of the targeted uses that the city would like to see, and would certainly be looking to incentivize depending on where it is, are brewpubs.”
Megan Mitchell: 303-954-2650, mmitchell@denverpost.com or twitter.com/MMitchelldp
Canoe Room
Location: 2801 Tower Road, Aurora
Hours: Noon to 6 p.m., Friday through Sunday
