Late last month in the Bronx, one of the city's oldest and largest seafood wholesalers filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection. The problems of M. Slavin & Sons Ltd. and its 80-year-old patriarch, Herb Slavin, could affect far more than creditors and its 105 workers, who fillet fish, drive delivery trucks and handle sales at its headquarters in the New Fulton Fish Market.
The century-old firm is the largest tenant of the Hunts Point market and the fourth in as many months to have hit a financial wall. The three previous casualties are gone for good, leaving the sprawling facility, which is run as a cooperative, with a 30% vacancy rate. Some of the 30 or so remaining tenants fear that Slavin's misfortune could drag them down, as they would have to pick up its share of the rent.
“If Slavin goes out, that will be a big hurt,” says Joseph Sciabarra, owner of Mt. Sinai Fish Inc. “They pay rent on 15% of the building.”
Business at the 400,000-square-foot market, which accounts for 5% of U.S. seafood sales, has been shrinking. According to Local 359, which represents the vast majority of the workers at New Fulton Fish, more than 50 vendors employing 500 people moved to Hunts Point; the union has just 350 members there today.
Read the complete story from Crain's New York.