The seafood park concept 



solution Barker and others envision is the 

 development of seafood industrial parks at key loca- 

 ong the coast. One such park— the Wanchese 

 Harbor Development Project— is already becoming a 

 lity. The 20-acre site in Dare County is expected to 

 be completed by 1980. Among other things, the 

 state-owned park will include facilities for major 

 seafood processing, storage and distribution opera- 

 Funding has also been approved for feasibility 

 studies on similar projects in the Carteret County 

 and Wilmington-Southport areas. 

 According to Barker, the seafood parks will be a 

 valuable boost to the entire industry. Because their 

 large-scale processing facilities will be able to accom- 

 odate tremendous volumes of fish, the parks will 

 lake it possible for fishermen to enlarge and modern- 

 Be their fleets. As a spin off of this, Barker foresees 

 ' e day of an expanded boat building industry within 



Of course changes such as these will not take place 

 tomorrow. For one thing the North Carolina seafood 



dustry is made up of a fiercely independent lot who 



e often skeptical of large-scale, government- 



onsored development schemes. 



for example, not everyone agrees with the seafood 

 industrial park concept. Some processors fear they 



ill lose substantial amounts of business to the 

 '"ger, out-of-state processors who can afford to 

 'locate in the parks. And there is some question as 



how much seafood dealers actually need to expand 

 'Wr markets. Like many dealers, Milton Evans of 

 "'ans Seafood Company in Washington is not par- 



'cularly interested in additional markets. "I've got 

 ! " I can handle," he emphasizes. "I don't need anv 

 •we markets." 



New markets or not, most observers agree that the 

 *rth Carolina seafood industry is in a stage of tran- 

 sition. For many this will simply mean business as 

 '»ual. But for a growing number of fishermen, 

 lessors and dealers, it will mean harvesting new 

 Wes of fish and meeting new market demands. 



Tapping the 



To most North Carolina coastal residents sitting 

 down to a meal of fresh croaker or mullet is as 

 natural as eating popcorn at the movies. But tell 

 someone from St. Louis or Cincinnati that you're ser- 

 ving Spanish mackerel for dinner and you're liable to 

 get a few stares. 



These fish, like many of the less traditional fish 

 caught off the South Atlantic coast, are virtually un- 

 known in the central sections of the United States. As 

 a result, markets for them have been primarily 

 limited to a narrow region along the Southeastern 

 coast. But if efforts to promote these species in the 

 Midwest pan out, eating king mackerel in Memphis 

 mav one day be as acceptable as eating rainbow trout 

 in Toledo. ' 



For nearly two years now the Gulf and South 

 Atlantic Fisheries Foundation, Inc. has been coor- 

 dinating the activities of nine different organizations 

 involved with the Midwest marketing program. The 

 basic purpose of the project is to encourage the use of 

 so-called underutilized fish through product develop- 

 ment and marketing. If successful, it will not only ex- 

 pose consumers in these states to a source of high 

 protein, low cost food but will provide South Atlantic 

 fishermen with an additional, year-round market for 

 their catch. 



The initial concept of a Midwest marketing 

 program began to take shape in 1975 when, in an ef- 

 fort to buoy up failing domestic shrimp prices, the 

 National Marine Fisheries Service instituted its 



idwest market 



Emergency Marketing Program. According to Roger 

 Anderson, executive director of the Gulf and South 

 Atlantic Fisheries Foundation, Inc., the Midwest was 

 selected for several reasons. First its location was 

 within reasonable reach of the Southeast. Plus it had 

 the vital characteristics of being a relatively untap- 

 ped market while having "good marketing potential." 



The success of the Emergency Marketing Program 

 eventually led to the current promotional program 

 with its focus on new species development — in par- 

 ticular croaker, gray trout, king and Spanish 

 mackerel, mullet and rock shrimp. 



Much of the money for the marketing effort comes 

 from the Coastal Plains Regional Commission. Other 

 organizations involved in the program include the 

 National Marine Fisheries Service, Florida Depart- 

 ment of Natural Resources, University of Georgia, 

 South Carolina Wildlife and Marine Resources 

 Department, Virginia Seafood Council, Virginia 

 Polytechnic Institute and State University, North 

 Carolina Fisheries Association and UNC Sea Grant. 



During individual marketing tours, promotion par- 

 ticipants from the various organizations visit target 

 cities in the Midwest. This year the program has ex- 

 panded to include 18 cities in Minnesota, Wisconsin, 

 Iowa, Missouri, Illinois, Indiana, Michigan, Ohio, 

 Tennessee and Kentucky. At each city, participants 

 visit buyers representing area retail and institutional 

 markets, providing samples and information on 

 where supplies can be obtained. 



TT>.T^'l. a little like being a travelin g salesman," notes 

 UNC Sea Grant participant Skipper Crow. "You spend 

 the day going from buyer to buyer." 



In addition to working with food brokers, partici- 

 pants place substantial emphasis on promoting the 

 products among consumers. Information on the 

 products, including recipe books, brochures and other 

 educational materials, are distributed at demonstra- 

 tions and exhibits. Marketing specialists also work 

 closely with newspaper food editors and conduct live 

 and taped radio and TV programs. 



So far marketing participants have been pleased 

 with the results. Last year they received over one 

 million dollars in complimentary advertising. And in 

 January, Kroger, Inc., a large, Cincinnati-based 

 grocery chain, instituted a fresh seafood market in 

 about 200 of its stores, selling about 100,000 pounds 

 of fish per week. "We think that alone has made it all 

 worthwhile," observes Jim Ayers, program partici- 

 pant and fishery marketing specialist with the 

 National Marine Fisheries Service. 



There are, of course, problems that will have to be 

 worked out before long-term markets in the Midwest 

 can be established. Both the logistics and economics 

 of transportation pose difficulties for dealers and 

 retailers. 



Currently it takes about seven to ten days to get 

 fresh fish from the ocean to markets in the Midwest. 

 With present packaging technology, that leaves the 

 retailer only a few days to sell the fish before its shelf 

 life expires— an added time constraint many retailers 

 are unwilling to work around. 



From the seafood dealer's perspective, the high 

 cost of transportation is another drawback to 

 marketing fish in the Midwest for the first time. 

 "There's no way you can just go into a place and sell a 

 truckload of fish," emphasizes Murray Nixon of 

 Murray Nixon Fisheries, Inc. in Edenton. "You gotta 

 do it gradually." 



"The quantities we could ship at the beginning 

 aren't enough to make it worthwhile," adds Tom 

 Caroon of the Riverview Crab Company in Oriental. 

 "The freight costs would eat us up." 



According to Anderson, consumer acceptance is 

 one of the biggest blocks to establishing markets in 

 the Midwest. "Everything is new ... the names are 

 new, the fish are new, the recipes are new. It takes a 

 long time to get consumer acceptance of anything 

 new." 



Hand-in-hand with this is the problem of educating 

 the people who handle the fish in the retail market. 

 'The guy behind the meat counter has got to be ade- 

 quately trained in handling the fish properly," 

 emphasizes Ayers, adding that it only takes one bad 

 experience to turn a consumer off to fresh seafood 

 altogether. 



Despite these problems, there are indications that 

 the Midwest marketing effort is paying off. Already 

 buyers such as Kroger are beginning to worry about 

 the availability of supplies on a year-round basis. In 

 North Carolina, seafood dealers are studying the 

 growth of these new markets with a watchful eye. 

 They know that success in the Midwest could signal a 

 change for the entire industry. 



