Whitby Seafoods: Yorkshire coast family business sells 52 million portions of scampi a year
The Yorkshire coast family business Whitby Seafoods is celebrating its 40th year of selling 52 million portions of scampi a year.
Whitby Seafoods was founded in 1985 by Graham Whittle and scampi has been produced in Whitby since the 1960s.
The shellfish is made with wild caught langoustines found around the British Isles and in 1997 his daughter Laura joined the business as the managing director.
They sell scampi to a range of supermarkets, pub chains and wholesalers and in recent years they have been selling 52 million portions of scampi a year.
“Scampi is a very quintessential British food,” Ms Whittle said.
“It’s one of the only seafood dishes that you can buy that’s fished in the UK as well. It’s fished in the waters around the British Isles.
“In the 1980s, my father bought the assets of Whitby Shellfish. He came to live on a tiny little boat in Whitby harbour to start the business. That was probably the first commercially sold wholesale scampi.
“Being made in Whitby was really important and it’s made with British wild caught langoustines.
“I joined the business in 1997, it had been going for 12 years by then. We had a turnover of about four million.
“It was a success, survival is a success and a few years later my brothers joined, so it became a proper family business.
“We bought a lot of our competitors, we grew, got a lot of new business as well and sold our product in supermarkets, in Sainsburys, Tesco, ASDA, and we also got our scampi on the menu of Wetherspoons and Marstons and pub chains like that.
“We make about a million portions of scampi a week, it’s huge. A year we sell about 52 million portions of scampi. We think we can grow the market even more.”
There have been many challenges the business had to overcome, the biggest being fishing.
“We have had a lot of challenges over the years but some of the challenges have been around fishing,” Ms Whittle said.
“You can only make scampi with British wild caught langoustines so it’s caught around the waters of the British Isles. The weather, the tide can be very unpredictable.
“This year is a really good fishing year, we have loads of scampi to sell which is great. Some years have been really hard where there hasn’t been enough fishing.
“We had maybe more customers than we had supplied for or the prices had gone very high. A lot of supply challenges have made life quite difficult over the years.”
Ms Whittle shared the secret to sustaining the business for 40 years.
“It’s not a coincidence that we’re a family business and that we’ve survived for 40 years,” she said.
“I think family businesses see things differently. We are really interested in the long term; it’s not about short term profit, I’m interested in this business being here for the next generation.
“We’ve had the privilege to work with our siblings. I’ve worked with my brothers and I love doing that, I’d really like my children to have that privilege.
“That tenacity comes from wanting to be here in years to come. We have people who have worked here for 30 and 40 years.
“What sets us apart is our commitment to quality. We have many times been told ‘your product is very expensive’, but we are selling wild caught British langoustine. We want it to have that very fresh, sweet flavour.
“We are really interested in delighting our customers, we’re not interested as much in price or doing things cheaply, we want to do things really well.”
When asked how they navigate the cost of living crisis and financial hardships, Ms Whittle said: “I know that scampi is seen as a bit of a treat.
“People who buy scampi tell me that they buy it, not as a Tuesday or Wednesday night quick meal, it’s more than that, as an everyday treat.
“You might have it on a Friday night or a Saturday night if you’re staying in. I think our role is to cheer people up. It’s to be that treat that you can still afford.
“[People] might not be going out to that fancy restaurant they really like because with food prices the way they are, they can’t afford it, but hopefully scampi is that bit of a treat.
“You can maybe make the chips yourself, or have your favourite tarter sauce with it, all the family likes it, kids really love scampi. You can have it together but it’s affordable. You can probably have scampi and chips for under a tenner.
“I think those little moments you have together as a family that aren’t going to break the bank, that lift you a bit above the normal dinner you have, are very important.”