File photo / Tim Greenway
Briana Warner
Updated: September 3, 2020
Saco food producer accelerates retail plans while doubling output
Courtesy / ATLANTIC SEA FARMS
Atlantic Sea Farms in Saco is increasing its harvest with “partner farmers” and expanding its retail presence.
Atlantic Sea Farms, a kelp processor in Saco, this year has nearly doubled its harvest of the seaweed in partnership with farmers along the coast of Maine.
The company expects to double its harvest again in 2021, while expanding the number of contracted farms.
And now Atlantic Sea Farms is poised to make gains in the retail market, after the pandemic shut down much of its wholesale business.
Production
Working with 27 “partner-farmers,” the company recently wrapped up a harvest of 450,000 pounds of kelp, up from 240,000 pounds with 24 partner-farmers in 2019. Many of the partners have started second farm sites, CEO Briana Warner told Mainebiz.
In 2021, the goal is to grow 800,000 pounds, she said. The company has nine employees, including a new "kelp innovation specialist" to help with the increase in production.
Pre-pandemic, the bulk of the harvest was packaged as frozen ready-cut kelp , kelp puree and fermented seaweed products for wholesale food service sales.
This year, Warner said, the pandemic created a lot of uncertainty around where the kelp would be sold, as wholesale customers shut down, many of which were fast casual chains.
For example, Little Beet, headquartered in New York City with outlets along the East Coast, incorporates the company’s kelp puree in its vegan ranch dressing and its ready-cut kelp in its salad base. Legal Sea Foods uses Atlantic Sea Farms' fermented seaweed salad.
Accelerated retail
The company last year developed a retail line of fermented kelp products that it launched on the East Coast at MOM’s Organic Market, Wegmans, Whole Foods stores in New England and independent natural grocers.
Warner's business was planning a national launch of its retail brand later this year. But the pandemic sped things up.
“We raised a convertible note round with our existing investors, who were confident in our ability to pivot but recognized we needed capital to pivot and accelerate to retail,” said Warner, who wouldn't disclose the amount of funding.
The money helped the company buy machinery to pack retail-size packaging, increase the advertising and in-store promotions budget, and secure retail shelf presence.
“We’ve been doing that the past two months,” she said.
This past Tuesday, the company debuted its frozen product through independent natural foods grocers in California, Washington and Oregon. Its fermented products will debut on the West Coast on Oct. 1. By mid-January, it will have its retail products in Sprouts Farmers Market, a Phoenix-based retailer with 300 stores in 23 states.
“We made the transition pretty swiftly to have a more retail focus,” Warner said.
As of June 1, the company was in 160 retail locations. By mid-January, Atlantic Sea Farms products will be in at least 720 stores, according to Warner.
She anticipates about 50% of this year’s harvest will go to retail, but the numbers are still unclear.
“It’s an interesting road to launch a national retail brand in the middle of a pandemic,” she said.
She added, “It feels like we’re starting to see a light at the end of this transition.”
The company still retains some important food service accounts, including Daily Harvest, a meal kit company.
The pivot to increased retail was important to the company’s mission, she added.
“We promised our partner-farmers that we would provide free seed and buy all of their kelp,” she said. At the start of the pandemic, “We sent an email to our partners saying that we’ll be there and we will buy everything you grew this year. It was powerful for them and for our staff to recognize that, no matter what, we stand behind our mission 100%, even in the worst of situations.”
The majority of farmers grow kelp as a supplemental income to their lobster fishing.
“They were heading into a difficult lobster year and had put a ton of work into their kelp farms,” she said. “We’re the only large-scale buyer that can back up that promise in Maine.”
The company also recently won Maine Aquaculture Hub funding to buy a kelp blancher to increase capacity for processing kelp. The expansion will allow Atlantic Sea Farms to buy more raw material from kelp farmers across the state.
Industry awards
Atlantic Sea Farms launched five retail products in April 2019, such as Sea-Chi, a fermented kimchi-like product that won a Good Food Award earlier this year; and Sea-Beet Kraut, a vegan probiotic sauerkraut.
Courtesy / ATLANTIC SEA FARMS
Atlantic Sea Farms’ fresh fermented seaweed salad won best new product in the pickles and olives category as part of the Specialty Food Association’s 2020 sofi awards.
One of the retail products, a fresh fermented seaweed salad, won best new product in the pickles and olives category as part of the Specialty Food Association’s 2020 "sofi" awards, a top honor in the $158 billion specialty food industry.
The salad was one of 148 winners selected from nearly 2,000 entries across 39 product categories.
“Atlantic Sea Farms is the first company bringing fresh, domestically line-grown seaweed to consumers in the U.S.,” Warner said in a news release.
“We are a woman-run company on a mission to mitigate the effects of climate change on our coast by introducing new and sustainable ways to grow regenerative kelp, all while providing a delicious, domestic, fresh, healthy alternative to imported seaweed products. Winning the sofi is one of the ultimate stamps of approval for the taste and quality of our products, and we’re incredibly grateful for this recognition.”
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