In this first‑person presentation, the speaker outlines Nautical Seafoods' evolution from a modest redfish processing venture into a dedicated lobster operation over the past six to seven years. After discovering that lobster feed waste was more profitable than fish processing, the company repurposed its facilities, expanding cold‑storage capacity from 20,000 lb to 500,000 lb. Located in District 35 on the Bay of Fundy—home to the world’s highest tides—the speaker attributes the extreme tidal environment to the strength and quality of the lobsters. The firm emphasizes its strategic logistics: a 30‑minute drive to the Digby Ferry (to St. John’s, NB, then an 8‑hour route to Boston), a 2‑hour drive to Yarmouth (to Portland, ME), and proximity to Halifax International Airport. Product quality is linked to a hard, meat‑filled shell, and packaging is flexible, ranging from 30‑lb Styrofoam boxes with moisture pads to individually boxed lobsters per customer request. The company is aggressively seeking new global markets, confident in its product and facilities.
Chapters
Nautical Seafood is a fairly new company. Been in the lobster business now 6 years, and every year with more vigor and more excitement. The company is growing a little every year, a little more. We're looking for new markets, aggressively looking to go around the world with this product we have here. We're We believe it's the best in the world, and we want to show it to people. Nautical Seafoods came to be almost as a mistake. We bought this place 7 years ago to try and develop a redfish or an ocean perch processing facility. And we were at that time selling the cuttings or the waste to lobster fishermen, and After trying our hand at that, we realized, you know what, what we're feeding the lobster is more profitable than what we're feeding the people. So we dismantled everything, turned it into a full-scale lobster operation, and here we are today with the capacity to hold 500,000 pounds in cold storage long-term. So that's a long ways from where we started 6 years ago with a capacity of 20,000. It's located right in the heart of District 35, and District 35 is a small but very important part of this whole lobster fishery. We're the first to open in the fall, October 15th, and we're the last to shut down in this area in the spring. We're located right on the Bay of Fundy. We have— the Bay of Fundy has the highest tides in the world, and we believe that it makes this product exceptionally strong because of the environment that it's living in. We got as much as 30 feet of tide elevation and drop here. Every 6 hours it goes up almost 30, and 6 hours later it's down almost 30. So these boats at high tide are all up by the wharf. When the tide is all gone, the harbor's empty. There's no water in our harbor. The boats are all sitting on the beach. So we believe these tides coming in and out of the bay make these animals strong, just because they have to be strong to live here, live in that environment. Nautical Seafoods is located 30 minutes from Digby Ferry, which takes us across to St. John's, New Brunswick. And from St. John's, New Brunswick into Boston, we have an 8-hour commute. We are located 2 hours from Yarmouth, which will take us across to Portland, Maine, as well as 2 hours from the Halifax International Airport. What makes a good lobster is a good strong shell. If he has a good strong shell, he's a healthy lobster. His shell is full of meat, and then his energy goes into his shell and makes his shell good and hard. Typically, the majority of the product goes out into a Styro— 30-pound Styro box, and it has provisions in there for wet napkin, we call it, to keep the product moist. And then we have frozen packages that goes in there to keep this product cool, and it works very well. Some customers will ask for an individual package where you'll put them in each on their tail and so it is. It's whatever the customer wants, really. I mean, we'll deliver— if he wants one lobster in a box, he'll get one lobster in a box. If he wants 3 or 4, he'll get 3 or 4. So it's customer-driven. We're very confident in our place and our product and our plant, and we're excited.
