Portland-based mussel grower acquires neighboring competitor
Courtesy / Bangs Island Mussels
CEO Matthew Moretti of Bangs Island Mussels said the company has acquired another local mussel grower and is doubling seaweed production.
Bangs Island Mussels, a Portland producer of rope-grown mussels sold in restaurants like Fore Street and Scales, has acquired another local grower, Calendar Island Mussel Co.
Bangs Island would not detail terms of the deal, but on Monday told Mainebiz it closed in the past several weeks and included all of Calendar Island’s eight mussel rafts and other equipment. The sale also included leased mussel sites adjacent to the Bangs Island ones in Casco Bay.
No Calendar Island employees have joined Bangs Island, but the company plans to hire a few full-time employees as a result of the acquisition, CEO Matthew Moretti said by email.
“We have successfully rolled the [Calendar Island] operation and assets into Bangs Island and we will continue to run the company as we have for the last nine years,” he said.
With the additional mussel rafts and others it has been adding, Bangs Island will have 28 rafts in operation by the end of the winter, Moretti said.
“We will also be doubling the amount of seaweed that we farm this year with a target of 160,000 pounds, all sustainably grown next to our mussel rafts,” he said in the email.
Bangs Island dates to 1998, when marine entrepreneur Tollef Olson started Aqua Farms LLC, which produced mussels using technology he adapted from European aquaculture.
The technology involves attaching seed to long ropes, suspended from rafts, and growing mussels to harvest size.
At the time, most Maine farmed mussels were grown by seeding the bottom. That product was inconsistent, due to inconsistent bottom conditions. “With rope-grown, you get a consistent product with a nice, thin shell,” Olson told Mainebiz last year.
He eventually sold the business to Moretti and his father, Gary Moretti, who own and operate Wild Ocean Aquaculture LLC on Portland’s waterfront.
The company is now one of the largest producers of farm-raised mussels and seaweed on the East Coast, according to a news release.
Its mussels are served in Portland restaurants like Fore Street, Scales and RiRa, according to its website. Products are also sold in Harbor Fish Market, as well as through wholesalers like Browne Trading and Maine Shellfish.
“It’s a very exciting time for us,” Matthew Moretti told Mainebiz.
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Bangs Island mussels are the best I've ever had by far.
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