Starting next Friday (Oct. 8), Dorchester Brewing Company (DBCo) brews will be on display at the downtown W Hotel, which plans to open an indoor, street-level beer garden with DBCo beers on tap, specialty beer-infused cocktails, and an Oktoberfest-inspired menu.
In addition to the beer garden, the W will feature in-room tasting flights of DBCo creations like Neponset Gold, Galaxy Lights, Light Year Journey, and more.
According to DBCo Co-Founder Matt Malloy, the partnership was a natural one.
“The common threads here are we both really care about diversity and inclusion, and that’s where we hit it off together. We’re very diversity-minded at Dorchester Brewing, we’re trying to, of course, represent the community, so it seemed like a natural human partnership. They were trying to do something cool and clever at their W location, and it seemed like a natural opportunity to expand and do something unique.”
Malloy first learned about a potential opportunity with the W Hotel several months earlier from a hotel employee.
“Usually, things start over beer,” Malloy said. “One of the people from the W was at Dorchester Brewing at an event, and said, ‘Hey, we should do something. I work at the W, and you do such an amazing job here. Let’s figure that out.’ And then three or four months went by and we got an email saying, ‘Hey, we’d love to work with you. We love your business model, we love what you’re doing for the community, and we’re very much like that.’
“The W came over to us to get a tour of the facility, and it was a natural evolution. Like-minded people getting together. I guess they had looked a couple of other breweries, and they settled in on us because they felt we were very authentic in our DEI initiatives and authentic about our passion for Dorchester, and they appreciated that.”
Gurki Singh, general manager at the W Boston, echoed the sentiment.
“We are going on more than a decade now – we opened in 2009 – and if you remember, right in front of where we are used to be the Combat Zone,” he said. “This building was built largely keeping in mind its history with the theater district, reviving the space, and being involved the community. We took on that corporate responsibility when we started operating this hotel. We wanted to be a good community player.” Since then, the W has made efforts to hire from the local community and stage community events, according to Singh.
“While you presume a hotel is only for people coming from outside the city, we as a brand believe that our living room should be the living room of the city, of the local community,” Singh said. “Our lobby, where our W lounge is, is more than just a place for guests mingling. It is a destination for locals on weekends.”
Throughout the pandemic, the W Hotel has pivoted its operations to focus on outdoor dining, partnering with a local business to “reopen and reenergize” the hotel. Seeing the success of that effort, staff at the W Hotel decided to bring that atmosphere inside for the winter through an indoor beer garden. Since the hotel specializes in mixology, not beer, they decided to join forces with a local brewery. In doing so, they talked to a number of local craft brewing companies, including Trillium and Nightshift. However, in the words of Singh, DBCo stood out.
“I had the pleasure of meeting Matt, and the passion Matt has for brewing is very obvious. He knows what he’s talking about, and that got me energized. While he’s passionate about craft beers, he acknowledged our DNA of mixology. And he said, ‘We’re going to highlight that while bringing in the beer influence.’
“What was really cool was that I got to walk his brewery, see what he was doing there. He started talking about why they opened the brewery there, and their involvement in Dorchester – they want to be supportive of the community and represent the community – and how they hire locally and how diversity is an important factor to them. All those [initiatives] resonated very much with our values. We’re trying to showcase a local brewery, and I think that the fact that our core beliefs align makes it so much easier to do business together.”
When asked about his hopes for the partnership, Malloy looked forward to bringing positive attention to Dorchester.
“It might bring more people downtown, and it might bring more downtown people to Dorchester,” he said. “Part of our mission is to bring people to Dorchester to experience how wonderful it is. I’ve lived here for about sixteen years, and part of the mission and goal was really to expose people to what Dorchester really is, not just what they hear in the news. It’s kind of fun to see the Dorchester name in front of such a prominent urban hip brand.”
“Guests, when they come in, are going to be sitting in a Dorchester beer hall. I love that the W is putting it front and center. When you walk into the room, you’re going to see our logo and photos of Dorchester everywhere, and that’s kind of nice. It’s cool to see Dorchester get represented in a way that maybe hasn’t been done before. It’s exciting.”
