To counter the shrinking of the US catfish business, many traditional catfish companies have broadened their product mix in an effort to grow larger and more diverse.
Isola, Mississippi-based Consolidated Catfish Producers, which does business as Country Select and and Delta Pride, is finding success by branching out into the Gulf of Mexico shrimp business.
The company was already importing salmon and tilapia, in an effort to broaden its product offerings and capitalize on its extensive US retail distribution network, when it went looking for opportunities closer to home.
“We wanted to help the Gulf Coast industry after Katrina and the BP deal,” Jack Perkins, vice president of Sales & Marketing at Consolidated, told IntraFish. “So we started looking at some shrimp processors, and we really wanted to focus on a Mississippi company.”
Perkins found a partner in Wally Gollott, owner of shrimp processing company Gulf Pride Enterprises in Biloxi, Mississippi.
Together the companies formed Gulf Pride Select Shrimp LLC, a partnership owned 50 percent by Consolidated and 50 percent by Gollott’s Gulf Pride Enterprises.
Set up as marketing, sales and distribution company, it developed a new brand -- Gulf Pride Select Shrimp -- of bagged IQF shrimp and introduced it to Consolidated's retail network of thousands of retail stores.