BACK in the early 1990's, microbreweries became a trend, and Long Island was not immune to it. While the industry was hot and the beer was cold, Southampton Publick House and the Blue Point Brewing Company in Patchogue entered the microbrewery business, too.

Now the companies say they are the only microbreweries — makers of fewer than 15,000 barrels of beer a year --- that remain on the Island, along with three brew pubs, restaurants that also make beer.
Blue Point is exclusively a microbrewery, and this year it expects to produce 9,000 barrels of beer. (A barrel holds 31 gallons.).

Southampton Publick House, at 40 Bowden Square in the heart of the village in the building once occupied by Herb McCarthy's restaurant, is a microbrewery and a brew pub. The beer-making goes on in the basement, and the operations can be through windows that line the restaurant and bar.

Last year, Southampton Publick House made about 3,000 barrels of beer, about 30 percent of it sold to other bars and restaurants or on a retail basis in bottles. Its owner, Donald Sullivan, 43, of Hampton Bays said that sales totaled about $700,000 last year.

Microbreweries were more prevalent a decade ago, but their popularity began to wane in the late 1990’s.. At least, three prominent microbreweries and several brew pubs on Long Island didn't survive, said Mark
Burford, one of Blue Point's owners.

Mr. Sullivan recalled Southampton Publick House's beginnings. "When we started in June 1996," he said, "we were probably toward the tail end of the growth cycle of brew pubs and microbreweries. The ones with the better product and that were soundly managed survived."

Mr. Burford, 42, agreed. He said that the microbrewery industry took off in the late 1970's and that "there were a lot of new players in the 1990's who got into it thinking it was a get-rich-quick scheme."

"But it was a difficult row to hoe," he said. "We had to find the right building and those with the expertise."

Finding a good distributor was also instrumental, said Robert M. Russo, the owner of Clydesdale's bar and restaurant in Franklin Square. The sales representative for Clare Rose Inc., Blue Point's distributor, "would come in and say, 'Do you guys want something native and cheap and that's comparable to Bud?' " Mr. Russo said. "I never would have heard of it otherwise. But that's why it's around — and it's a good beer."

Mr. Burford, who is Blue Point's brewmaster, worked for 15 years at other brewries, including the Long Island Brewing Company in Jericho and Cobblestone Brewery in Huntington, both now closed. He and Peter Cotter opened Blue Point in December 1998 in the former Penguin ice cream factory, equipment bought at auction from microbreweries that had gone out of business.

"Mark is an incredible brew master," said Mr. Cotter, 42. "He knew that the product we were to come out with would be superior."

The microbreweries that failed, Mr. Cotter said, tended to 'be brew-pub operations. "Their primary business was their restaurant," he said. "But for us, it's all about beer. We don't have to worry about the French fries."

Southampton Publick and Blue Point, both privately owned, say they experienced small but steady sales growth in the early years, but both noted a significant increase in the last two or three years.

The New Brewer, the journal of the Brewers Association in Boulder, Colo., reported in its May-June edition that microbrewery beer sales increased 7 percent last year, but that regional specialty breweries — those that make 15,000 to 60,000 barrels a year - experienced average growth of 12 percent last year. Mr. Burford said that Blue Point's sales had more than doubled this year, thanks to an increase in bottled beer. Blue Point made 6,400 barrels last year, compared with. 1,200 barrels in 1999, the company's first full year.

Now Southampton Publick and Blue Point want to expand.

Mr. Buford said he and Mr. Cotter were looking for property to build another brewery, and once they find it, they said. Blue Point will become a regional brewery producing more than 15,000 barrels annually.

Mr. Sullivan said his company expanded late last year, contracting with the Old Saratoga Brewing Company in Saratoga Springs, N.Y., to bottle his best seller, Southampton Secret Ale.

Since November, his brew master, Philip Markowski, has been traveling to the Oid Saratoga plant one day a month to supervise the brewing. In a day's time, the plant produces 1,500 cases of Secret Ale, Mr. Sullivan said.

He said he decided to bottle the ale because many customers at his restaurant asked if they could buy it: elsewhere. "We felt there was a limited risk in trying to sell our product in bottles in the greater New York area," he said.

Blue Point's best-selling beer, Toasted Lager, won the second-place silver medal at a competition, last year organized by the Brewers Association. After the competition, Mr. Cotter said, "a lot of distributors called to say they knew we won" and wanted to sell the beer.

As a result, it is now distributed in Pennsylvania, Massachusetts, Maryland and up-state New York. Mr. Burford said Blue Point is selling almost as beer in bottles in Baltimore as in. New York City, the Patchogue plant is working at near capacity.

"We could squeeze a little bit out," Mr. Burford said, "We are making beer six or seven days a week, at least 10 or 12 a day."

Blue Point is also widely available on tap in about 500 restaurants on Long Island and in New York City, and Southampton Publick's Secret Ale is available in 40 to 50 restaurants.

Mr. Sullivan is working with local wineries to bottle small batches of specialty brews in 750 millilieter bottles with wine corks, a wire cage and foil wrap. "They fit us into their production schedule," he said. "It's an example of small business co-operation."