Sweet Grown Alabama Blogs

Almost every day, Chris Nelson, president of Bon Secour Fisheries, discovers something new about the sea life his company sells. “All the different critters we deal with, how and where they grow, where and when they’re found and caught — all of that intrigues me,” he says. 

The opportunity for endless education fits his background, one that includes a master’s degree in biological oceanography, a Sea Grant Fellowship and a job at the National Fisheries Institute before he joined his family’s 134-year-old business in 1989. He left the marine science world behind but brought his constant curiosity with him, so the life-long learning facet of his work keeps him going in the face of challenges. 

As does the knowledge that his great grandfather, his grandfather, and his father encountered and overcame obstacles, too. During its more than a century in operation, Bon Secour Fisheries has ebbed, flowed and evolved with the seafood industry’s ever-shifting tides.

The Bon Secour Fisheries story begins in 1892, when Frank Nelson, a Danish immigrant, started growing oysters in Bon Secour Bay and then harvesting them and selling them in Mobile. “He’d either purchase small oysters from catchers who got them off public reefs or go get them from the reefs himself and then scatter them on the bay bottom to let them grow out for him to harvest,” Nelson says. 

Frank’s son joined in, and so did his grandson, Nelson’s dad John Ray Nelson. For decades, the business grew in size, but ran on the same model — growing, packing and selling oysters. “The environment in the bay was supportive of that through the 1950s and into the early '60s,” Nelson says. But then, something, or more likely, several somethings, changed, and the number of oysters his family could grow steadily decreased. Eventually, the decline pushed the family out of the oyster-growing business. “The company then became reliant on getting and processing oysters from Texas and Louisiana, primarily Louisiana,” Nelson says, “with a few still being bought from Alabama waters.”

But as Bon Secour Fisheries transitioned to out-of-state oysters to meet demand, access to another seafood item increased. Boat and trawling improvements allowing shrimpers more access to large offshore shrimp populations in the Gulf brought on a shrimping boom. “In the 1960s, through the 1970s and even into the 1980s, the Gulf produced an abundance of shrimp, with shrimpers bringing in huge hauls,” Nelson says. 

Soon, shrimp rose to the No. 1 spot on Bon Secour Fisheries’ product list. But the industry switched course again when farmed shrimp from overseas flooded the market in the mid 1980s and lowered prices, and environmental regulations made domestic shrimping harder. “There were concerns, and still are, about shrimp nets trapping more than shrimp, such as sea turtles, including some threatened and endangered species,” Nelson says. “All combined, it hampered that industry.”

So, to move ahead, Bon Secour Fisheries needed to look back. “We turned our focus once more to oysters,” Nelson says. The transition from a shrimp business that did a little bit of oysters to primarily an oyster-processing company has come with some struggles, but Bon Secour Fisheries has surmounted hurdles before, and leaning on that history helps Nelson stay hopeful.

Today, Bon Secour Fisheries sources as much local and regional seafood as it can, positioning itself as a specialty producer and distributor of Gulf and Southeastern items — with its Nelson’s Brand Gulf Oysters, sold live and in-shell or shucked, now its top product — and sells directly to restaurants as well as food-service distributors who also sell to restaurants. “Each market is about half our business,” Nelson says. 

Most of its oysters still come from Louisiana and Texas, arriving at Bon Secour Fisheries’ plant on the banks of the Bon Secour River via its fleet of refrigerated trucks, where they are processed, packed and then distributed. Head-on, headless, peeled, and peeled and deveined shrimp, including the Gulf’s prized Royal Reds, as well as non-Gulf shrimp and other out-of-area items restaurants want, like snow crab and salmon, round out the company’s offerings. It also sells a small amount of product to retail establishments like grocery stores and fish markets. 

While shrimp remain a part of Bon Secour’s business, the South’s beloved bivalves hold Nelson’s affection. “I especially love the oyster side of the business,” he says. “That animal fascinates me.” This underpins Nelson’s support of Alabama’s growing off-bottom oyster farming industry and even moved him to try farming himself back in the 1990s. “When I joined the business, my dream was to grow oysters in the bay.” He tried it, and proved it was doable, but it didn’t make financial sense. “The techniques to do it successfully here weren’t well worked out yet,” he says. “But they are now, and I’m proud we provide some farmed oysters. I want to promote that part of the oyster industry. It’s sustainable and producing a great oyster.”

Bon Secour Fisheries now provides both local seafood and products from all over to more than 200 customers, yet Nelson and his team’s commitment to freshness, quality and service harkens back to the business’ humble beginnings. “We’re still a family company; my brother David is executive vice president,” he says. “And, many things have changed in the long time that Nelsons have been doing this, but our attention to detail and dedication to treating our customers right isn’t one of them.”