Maine’s Department of Marine Resources is launching a million-dollar marketing campaign to get Maine seafood onto more Americans’ plates.
Agency Commissioner Patrick Keliher says the move aims to shore up seafood harvesters’ prospects as they continue to struggle with the holes the pandemic has punched in their biggest end-market — restaurants in the U.S. and overseas.
“We started looking at the home chef, we started looking at local domestic markets, the supermarkets, the seafood dealers, and to expand the exposure in those particular areas,” he says.
Keliher is using $1 million of DMR’s $20 million allotment from the federal CARES Act to finance the marketing push. The rest of that money will be split up among qualifying Maine seafood producers.
The “Seafood from Maine” program will rely heavily on social media, Keliher says, and promote all the state’s marine harvests — lobster, groundfish, shellfish and seaweed. Its lifesaver-shaped logo features two key messages: “premium” and “pristine.”