News Release Archive
ECONOMIC DEVELOPMENT/TOURISM--TUSKET'S SANS SOUCI PLANT UPGRADES
-----------------------------------------------------------------
To keep its competitive edge over international suppliers, Sans
Souci Seafoods Ltd. has just upgraded its fish-drying facility in
Tusket, Yarmouth Co. The expansion could mean up to 50 new jobs
for the area.
"Our upgraded facility will lower production costs, enable a
faster inventory turnover and increase the range of finished
products available for our customers," said company president
Roger Smith. Depending on industry growth, the company expects to
hire between 40 and 50 people as a result of the plant expansion.
Nova Scotia Economic Development and Tourism is helping the
company with a $600,000 term loan for equipment and a provincial
guarantee of $3 million to arrange an additional operating line
of credit.
"Sans Souci is a proven leader in the salt-fish processing
industry," said Manning MacDonald, Minister of Economic
Development and Tourism. "We're pleased to help the company
increase capacity and create jobs in the process."
The company is one of the largest salt fish producers in Canada,
with annual sales of more than $30 million. It currently employs
100 people full-time and markets products to wholesalers on the
U.S. eastern seaboard, Puerto Rico and most of the other
Caribbean islands.
Keeping the company's customer base is essential, Mr. Smith said.
"Once you've lost that base, it's too difficult to gain
significant re-entry into the marketplace. My philosophy is that
it's extremely easy to get a pound of salt fish but much harder
to get a new customer."
To date, the company's efforts are working. "We've been
profitable for the past several years and have demonstrated our
commitment by reinvesting in the future growth of the industry,"
he said.
Mr. Smith is no stranger to the fishing industry. He founded a
number of fish-processing facilities over the years, including
his first plant at Sandy Point, Shelburne Co., in 1972. The
Tusket operation opened in 1981.
Sans Souci is French for "without a care," but carefree is not an
apt description. The plant has endured several setbacks,
including a fish market crash in 1988. It also had to find new
suppliers for raw material with the downturn in the East Coast
fishery.
The company is now importing more than 6.8 million kilograms (15
million pounds) of fish a year from Alaska, Iceland, Norway and
Russia. "We have to fight to maintain our markets by importing
fish from all over the world until our own resources return to
sustainable levels," said Mr. Smith. "We cannot and will not lose
one customer."
The imported fish is cut and boned, then dried and packaged at
San Souci's Tusket plant for export. "That is all value-added
production providing jobs in our community," said Mr. Smith.
The company produces more than 100 products using mainly pollack,
cod, hake and cusk. With the expansion, the plant will increase
capacity to 54,500 kilograms (120,000 pounds) of raw material
daily from about 36,300 kilograms (80,000 pounds).
-30-
Contact: Angela Poirier
Economic Development and Tourism
902-424-1593
E-mail: econ.poirieam@gov.ns.ca
Roger Smith
Sans Souci Seafoods Ltd.
902-648-3427
ngr September 2, 1997 - 10:25 am
