The Work We Do: Michelle Demetillo, North Fork Brewing Co.

My name is Michelle Demetillo.

I’m the Hospitality & Community Manager at North Fork Brewing Company in Riverhead. 

My job duties vary. My main priority is making sure that the tasting room is functional and clean, that all of our customers coming in are having a great experience and a fun experience in this environment. We have a two-acre farm in Peconic, and whatever hops we can use from that, we do. Typically we have 12 beers on tap, so there’s a variety of beers for people to choose from.

I also help with social media, marketing, some administrative duties and events. We’ve hosted beer dinners; our most recent one was a collaboration with Mattitaco in Mattituck.

I dated a brewer and that’s how I got introduced to the craft beer world.

I worked part time at Moustache Brewing down the road, then left to work in marketing. Peter, one of the owners, actually also worked at Moustache as an assistant brewer. When he opened the brewery, he asked me if I wanted to come on board. I loved this industry, so I wanted to come back to it.

Since we opened last year, it’s definitely been an amazing experience to watch the growth and the development of not only this brewery, but this area as well.

We are in the old Riverhead firehouse. It was built in the late 1800s. It stayed vacant for about 10 years until we signed the lease on this property.

It’s not like your average bar. I think breweries in general are community hubs. It gives people a place to meet, and just have fun and connect. We’ve had a book club meet here before.

It’s a place where people can really connect and have genuine, authentic conversation. That’s another thing I love about the industry, is sharing organic conversation with people who come here.

I love the beer industry. It’s all about community. And it’s very creative, making beers, naming beers.

Obviously, there’s friendly competition all around in the industry. But I think for the most part we’re just very supportive, and we’re all in it for the same reason: making great, artisanal craft beer and wanting people to enjoy it.

“The Work We Do” is a News-Review multimedia project profiling workers around Riverhead Town. It is made possible by Peconic Landing. See more photos every Monday on Instagram @riverheadnewsreview.