Hartford Business Journal

8 Hartford Business Journal • June 15, 2020 • www.HartfordBusiness.com ogy — and employs an innovative recirculating aquaculture system that filters out and recovers fish waste and uneaten feed, which is eventually turned into fertilizer for Connecticut land-based farmers. The end product is a more sustain- able fish farming operation that is able to get its products to consumers quicker (within 24 hours of a harvest vs. a week or so from overseas com- petitors). The company also doesn't use antibiotics to rear its fish. Ideal Fish quickly gained a following, raising upwards of $20 million from domestic and international inves- tors and growing into a $3-million to $5-million company primarily selling to restaurants and high-end grocery stores like Kings Food Markets, Fair- way Food Market and Balducci's. But then the coronavirus pan- demic hit. "As the shelter-in-place policies came about and restaurants were forced to close, we lost nearly 60% of revenues overnight," said Pederson, a former Wall Street banker who earned his MBA from the Wharton School at the University of Pennsylvania. While grocery store sales have re- mained strong and even picked up a bit, Pederson said his nascent com- pany faced immediate operational and financial challenges that forced him and his team to think outside- of-the-box and pivot quickly. On the sales front, Pederson said he needed to expand his customer base so he hired an outside consul- tant in mid-March to launch an e- commerce platform to sell directly to consumers who crave healthy, fresh and local food. Ideal Fish now sells branzino on its website and through Amazon — it's $15.99 for a whole fish and $24.99 for four filets. It also re- cently added smoked Mediterranean sea bass to its product line. The moves have paid dividends as Ideal Fish has already recouped about half of its lost restaurant revenues in just two months. The e-commerce platform will become a permanent part of the business, Pederson said. Financially, the company remains well capitalized and has gotten sup- port from its investors as well as loans from the federal government's Paycheck Protection Program and the state Department of Economic and Community Development (DECD). The DECD funds helped finance the e-commerce platform and smok- ing equipment. On the operational side, Peder- son said his company had to cre- atively manage its fish population while sales dropped off to prevent overcrowding in tanks. To do that, they've reduced feed rates and moved large fish into separate tanks. He also had to ensure his 10 full-time employees remained healthy so he split them into two groups that rotate roles every 14 days; half manage the farming operations, while the other half handle administrative work at home. "We needed to mitigate risk in case there was an outbreak," he said. "Luck- ily we haven't had any outbreaks." Ideal Fish also hasn't had any layoffs, although it did implement a hiring freeze, Pederson said. So far, the company has been able to ride out the economic uncertainty and Pederson remains bullish about the future. He's already plotting growth opportunities including opening a second Waterbury facility to harvest salmon and other fish species. In the meantime, Ideal Fish will begin selling salmon this year sourced from another domestic re- circulating aquaculture facility. He's projecting sales will hit about $6.5 million by the end of 2021. "This is an industry that Connecti- cut needs to develop," Pederson said. "Connecticut is a fantastic place to build out this industry because it's between the major seafood market between Boston and Washington D.C. and local fish production is key." For Hartford-based marketing firm, pandemic downgrades a record year By Matt Pilon mpilon@hartfordbusiness.com I n February, Hartford-based GO- Agency had recently won some new business, giving the compa- ny plenty of work in its pipeline. In fact, the 13-year-old marketing and communications firm was expect- ing its best year yet. Then March and the COVID-19 pandemic arrived in Connecticut, and things changed quickly. "Dozens of campaigns we were working on were affected," said Chad Turner, CEO of the 19-employ- ee agency, normally headquartered at 2074 Park St. Like many office-based companies, GO's employees today are working at home. Some may return to the office by late June, but GO is in no rush to bring staff back to headquar- ters, Turner said. "We want to do it right," he said, adding that some employees have FOCUS: SMALL BUSINESS >> Survival Tactics continued A film crew from Hartford's GO- Agency conducts a socially distanced interview with Lynn Ricci, CEO of the Hospital for Special Care, for an advertising campaign. Ideal Fish distributes its sea bass to restaurants and high-end grocery stores like Kings Food Markets, Fairway Food Market and Balducci's. PHOTO | CONTRIBUTED PHOTO | CONTRIBUTED

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