PORTLAND — ‘Tis the season and Shipyard Brewing Company’s Pumpkinhead Ale, brewed in Portland, was as much Halloween to the adults as candy apples are to children. And just in time for Thanksgiving and Christmas…. I spoke to Fred M. Forsley, president of Shipyard Brewing Company, about his popular Halloween Ale, new flavors for the winter holidays and other aspects of the Shipyard family.

What do you attribute the success of Pumpkinhead to?

“I think it’s a combination of things, the product, the drinkablity of it, the uniqueness of it in the sense that it hits a wide range of drinkers, and it’s not a heavy alcohol like a lot of the other beers are. Alan Pugsley, the master brewer at Shipyard, and Mike Haley first brewed Pumpkinhead 17 years ago down at Federal Jack’s Kennebunkport Brewing in Kennebunk and from the first brew, customers just loved it. It’s unique in the sense that It’s not an overpowering pumpkin flavor and other spices, but strong in those that give it real flavor.”

We’re sure it’s popular, and more so at Halloween, but does it stay popular the rest of the year?

“We start brewing it in early July, so we can release it in late August, September and October. People have said to us a thousand times that we should brew it year-round, but it’s like having Christmas year round and why would you want to do that? Our Summer Ale is popular. Each year it’s grown and of course Pumpkinhead has been a huge success. Prelude is a popular beer down south; it’s had pockets of success. It’s definitely exciting to see the seasonal beers take off the way they have. And we have a Black IPA and a Mint Chocolate Stout coming soon.”

Tell about the racks of oak barrels I saw at the brewery.

“Yes, the barrel series. We have whiskey and wine barrels that we’ve gotten from around the country. We’ve done a variety of different styles in oak whiskey barrels that we age from a month to three months and come out with special beers — Double Old Thumper, barrel aged is just one, and we’ve met with huge success with that, we’ve sold out of all of them, so we will expand on that.”

Shipyard Brewing is synonymous with Maine. Are you anywhere else in the country?

“We’re aggressively trying to grow in New York and New Jersey and we’re throughout New England. We’re in Florida and California. We’ve been in 32 states total, but we’re going to try to focus down the Eastern Seaboard with growth there and I’m real excited about that.”

How long have you been president of Shipyard Brewing?

“Since we formed it. We formed Kennebunkport Brewing in June 1992 and we formed Shipyard in 1994. We moved to Portland when we needed more capacity, so over 21 years. We’re going to push 200,000 barrels for a year and a barrel is 31 gallons.”

And it’s in cans now?

“In the last year we’ve had cans. We’ve had some success with that, limited success, so we’re going to keep doing it.”

Anything you’d like to say in general about Shipyard?

“We’re coming off a World Series win with the Red Sox and it’s all about team. I’m just really proud to be associated with our team of brewers and [our] sales team. We employ over 700 people in Maine in the summertime in our restaurants and brew pub and brewery. Anybody that supports us, I’m proud of and it’s definitely an economic engine and at the same time it’s a quality product and we’re proud of. We’re happy to have Mainers support us.”