Wild Local Seafood Co. — Expanding the menu
Wild Local Seafood in Ventura added a third boat in the last year to increase the species of fresh fish the company offers.
When Ben Hyman of Wild Local Seafood Co. purchased his new boat— a Calvin Beal lobster boat called Ruth Anne II, it wasn’t just about expanding his fleet—it was about deepening his commitment to sustainable fishing. He brought the boat down the coast from Santa Cruz to Santa Barbara so he could use it to fish for lobster, Dungeness crab and salmon. With this boat, Hyman can now access fresh, local lobster while adhering to strict environmental guidelines that protect the ocean’s delicate ecosystems. His company continues to grow by making sustainability a priority, ensuring that every catch meets high standards of environmental responsibility while delivering fresh seafood to communities that value both quality and conservation.
Part of the reason for the investment was to ensure that there’s more sources of revenue for the company that focuses on offering sustainably, locally caught fish for sale.
“Lobster season was pretty damn good, but (commercial fishing) is one of those industries where you’re not guaranteed a paycheck,” said Hyman, 45, who founded Wild Local Seafood in 2013. “You can work two straight weeks and lose money.”
He renamed the lobster boat Nancy Lee to honor his mother and on the Wild Local Seafood Facebook page, he thanked his father on Father’s Day for teaching him the skills he now uses to make a living. Dedication to family is something that his parents passed on to Hyman, who takes his 9-year-old son out on the water with him whenever possible. When we spoke, Hyman was on the sidelines of a soccer field watching his son practice.
With the addition of the Nancy Lee, the Wild Local Seafood fleet numbers three vessels. Hyman spends the most time on the water, fishing seven days a week and coming in at night to offload and spend time with his son. The company has 14 employees. Like Hyman, who studied marine biology and history at the University of California, Santa Barbara, most of the people who work for Wild Local Seafood have four-year degrees and are passionate about sustainable fishing practices. “Two of my farmer’s market representatives are marine biologists,” said Hyman.
He started running his own boat, a salmon troller called the Rose Lann, in 2003 and launched Wild Local Seafood to ensure that fish caught off the California coast stayed in the area, available to local consumers. “I started Wild Local to give local people the ability to buy local,” said Hyman. He explains that the most eaten seafoods in the United States are shrimp that are farm-raised in Southeast Asia and tuna that is imported even though the species can be caught locally on both coasts. “We ship all of our good seafood out of the country,” said Hyman.
Wild Local Seafood works with a cooperative of 69 partner boats in Santa Barbara, Morrow Bay and Ventura. They all abide by the quotas, seasons, size restrictions and more rules established at the state and federal levels to ensure that they are fishing sustainably and that species will not be over-fished.
“We’re just trying to get people into our fish market and into our famer’s markets,” said Hyman. “With hyper-local sourcing, the money stays in the economy.”
Wild Local Seafood sells fresh fish seven days per week from 10 a.m. to 6 p.m. at its shop in Ventura Harbor Village. The company also participates in nine farmers markets in southern and central California – Santa Monica on Wednesday and Saturday, the Pico Santa Monica market in Virginia Park on Saturday, Santa Barbara on Saturday, and Hollywood, Mar Vista and Long Beach on Sundays. The company also sells to many local restaurants and Hyman says he’s working on trying to get into the wholesale business so he can sell to more restaurants.
Species available through Wild Local Seafood include lobster, Dungeness crab, tuna, rock fish, black cod, halibut, ling-cod, sea bass, thresher shark, squid and more.
Last year and this year, the company faced an added challenge when the state of California, the National Marine Fisheries Service and the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration shut down the salmon season because of something called an “escapement number.” Officials basically count the salmon and if they don’t record a high enough number, the season is closed. “We’ve had years where they tell us there are 70,000 salmon,” said Hyman, who added that catching salmon by hand is his favorite way to fish.
To help make ends meet, Wild Local Seafood did receive a grant from the U.S. Department of Agriculture in 2021. Hyman says his goal with the company remains the same as when he started. “This was never about profitability,” he said. “It was about keeping everyone paid and my son fed. We’re just a group of people trying day after day to get the local public to eat local seafood. Good seafood isn’t cheap and cheap seafood isn’t good.”