Since its founding in 1899, High Liner Foods has continued to reimagine itself, navigating major industry disruptions and evolving from a regional operation into a continental powerhouse.
Paul Jewer, president and CEO, shares how the Lunenburg, Nova Scotia-based seafood company transitioned from supplying cod to the local community to becoming one of North America’s largest producers and marketers of frozen, “value-added” seafood products. The transformation required bold strategic pivots, particularly when cod stocks vanished from U.S. waters in the 1980s, which forced the company to completely reimagine its business model and geographic focus.
How has High Liner Foods grown over the past 125 years?
High Liner Foods has a deep and rich 125-year history. Our company’s purpose statement is, “reimagining seafood to nourish life,” which reflects how the company has operated over our entire history and where we are focused for our future.
We have continuously evolved and altered courses to meet market demands and shifting landscapes and our history reflects our resilience as an organization and our responsiveness and ability and willingness to change as we see and need to.
The company started in December of 1899 as the W.C. Smith and Company Ltd. in Lunenburg. Over the years, we’ve faced challenges, as all companies do, and High Liner has continued to reimagine itself, expanding its operations to the United States and abroad and transformed to become a well- recognized and respected value-added processor and seller of seafood within the global seafood industry.
One major transitional and transformational moment that stands out for us is when the cod stocks disappeared off the coast of the U.S. back in the 1980s, High Liner had to decide as to who they were going to be as an organization. The decision was made to focus on value-added seafood across North America being supplied by raw material from across the world.
And this remains who High Liner Foods is today. You can imagine what a difficult decision it was at the time and how they had to transform the company, but it’s a great example of the company we are.
Another reason for our longevity and long-term success is our employees and the contribution they make every day to the success of High Liner Foods. And that success has shown up over the last 125 years where we put the customer first and focus on the quality of our product.
What are some key innovations in your industry?
We are in a protein industry with so much growth potential and we put great emphasis on innovation to help see this growth potential become reality.
Seafood is a healthy and sustainable source of protein. In North America, seafood is under consumed. Our opportunity is to help educate consumers as to why they should consume more seafood and make it convenient for them to eat more of it.
We have an in-house team dedicated to innovation. We are constantly in research and development on a variety of innovative activities including launches of brand-new products, new recipes or new forms of value-adding and packaging that are more convenient for the consumer.
We see “ready to eat”—i.e., fully cooked—as a platform for growth and are actively engaged in innovation in this area, particularly in foodservice, to unlock new opportunities for convenience stores and quick service restaurants.
We are also keenly focused on the diversification of species. Currently, our strongest business is in white fish and we believe there is great growth opportunity beyond this species. We are focused on growth in salmon and shrimp as well.
Over the last 18 months, we have made strategic investments in Norcod and Andfjord, two aquaculture companies focused on forward-thinking sustainable cod and salmon. These investments reinforce our position and influence in emerging growth areas in our industry.
The continual rising cost of living and inflation is a consideration for consumers and we are expanding our lower-cost value options, as well as our value-added offerings to help consumers affordably put more seafood on their plates.
Over the course of your career, what are some lessons you’ve learned along the way?
Leadership can have a significant impact on an organization. I have learned the value of strong leadership and over my career have continuously worked to develop leadership skills that will play a positive role in an organization and within an industry.
There are some key characteristics of great leadership that I learned along the way. I attribute these to my upbringing in Newfoundland and have honed them over the years. They have helped shape me as a leader. Interestingly, each of these characteristics begin with H: humility, honesty, hard work, humour and humanity.
Humility: as a leader this is critical. It allows you to connect with people authentically. You need to always remember why you are in this leadership role and that it’s about supporting and motivating those who work for you, about the company you are representing and the industry you are working in.
Honesty: Your integrity as a leader is something you work hard to build. You want people to believe in you and trust in you as a leader.
Hard work: It’s important to put in the work, through your entire career. The more you put in, the more you will get out of it.
Humor: You need to have a sense of humor. It’s important to be a serious leader, but there are certain times and experiences when you need step back, have a sense of humor, learn from it and come back even stronger as a result.
Humanity: I have the good fortune of being a leader and with that I have a strong sense of responsibility to our people and society more broadly and think about what I am doing for employees, our community and our industry.
What does the future hold for the company?
We are always thinking about what’s next, whether that be through our R&D efforts and bringing new products to market, the further diversification of species we are working with, or the efficiencies across our supply chain.
We do also always have our eyes open to potential M&A opportunities, if the right opportunity were to come along. We just recently completed our acquisition of Mrs. Paul’s and Van de Kamps brands from Conagra Brands. This strategic acquisition is investment in our future. These two leading products are welcome additions to our existing portfolio of consumer favourite frozen seafood brands and further diversify our product offerings in the U.S. retail market.
We are a company that has always put the customer and quality of our products first. And that will continue to be of focus in our future—meeting customer and consumer interests and needs and helping North Americans enjoy more seafood.
