September 24, 2025 — The Maine lobster industry, along with e-commerce suppliers and restaurants, are promoting the crustacean during National Lobster Day on 25 September and Maine Lobster Week, which runs from 21-28 September.
National Lobster Day honors the hardworking individuals who sustain Maine’s iconic lobster fishery, the Maine Lobster Marketing Collaborative (MLMC) said in a press release.
October 4, 2021 — The Gulf of Maine lobster fishery has had a key sustainability label reinstated a year after it was suspended following the publication of a controversial set of new rules designed to protect the critically endangered North Atlantic right whale.
The American division of the Marine Resources Assessment Group announced last week that the Gulf of Maine lobster fishery is once again certified sustainable by the Marine Stewardship Council. The certification is retroactive to Sept. 1.
That means wholesalers and retailers who sell U.S.-landed Gulf of Maine lobster can again use the council’s trademarked “eco-label” of a blue-and-white fish that signals to buyers that the product is sustainable, meaning it is not overfished, that the fishery is well managed and does not harm another overfished or endangered species.
The council’s certification is considered the gold standard of sustainable seafood, embraced by high-volume lobster buyers such as Whole Foods, Hilton, Royal Caribbean and Walmart.
Marianne LaCroix, executive director of the Maine Lobster Marketing Collaborative, said she was pleased with the reinstatement of the fishery’s Marine Stewardship Council certification, “but it hasn’t changed what we’ve always known – Maine lobster harvesting practices are among the most sustainable in the world.”
Still, it can be a useful tool for customers who rely on such third-party sustainability marks to aid their purchasing decisions, she said.
Read the full story from Hannah LaClaire at Portland Press Herald
March 3, 2021 — A year after the coronavirus pandemic devastated Maine’s usual lobster markets, and as the industry braces for yet another onslaught of changes brought about by right whale regulations, state legislators are proposing a bill to reauthorize the organization that markets Maine’s signature shellfish for at least five more years.
The Maine Lobster Marketing Collaborative, created in 2013 to replace the Lobster Promotion Council, promotes Maine lobster to restaurants, cruise ships, casinos, hotels and, especially within the past year, to grocery stores and home cooks.
Its $2.2 million annual budget is funded by surcharges on state-issued lobster licenses. The surcharges are not set to change under the proposed legislation.
The collaborative’s five-year authorization is set to expire in October, but according to Patrick Keliher, commissioner of the Maine Department of Marine Resources, it’s more important than ever that the group’s work continues.
December 16, 2020 — Though 2020 will be remembered for many things, it also may be remembered as the year when online, direct-to-consumer sales of Maine seafood took off.
In a year that saw continued wrangling over foreign trade agreements — which hampered overseas sales of Maine lobster, the state’s dominant seafood product — and a severe drop in restaurant sales due to precautions aimed at containing the spread of COVID-19, many seafood harvesters and producers have sought to connect directly with consumers to stay afloat.
A new marketing initiative launched this month by the state — created with $1 million in COVID-19 federal relief funds — is the latest effort geared toward making it easier for consumers to buy Maine seafood directly from distributors and retailers. A website borne of that initiative, SeafoodfromMaine.com, follows suit with other sites such as Localcatch.org and Lukeslobster.com that aim to connect consumers and sellers directly online, or to guide consumers to retailers that sell locally sourced seafood.
August 19, 2020 — Last year, Maine’s lobster fishery brought in almost $500 million to the state, and even more when you count the economic benefits to dealers, processors and restaurants. Now, with the pandemic hindering the market for lobsters locally and around the world, this signature industry has been impacted severely. We will talk about how the industry is facing challenges, and what efforts are underway to find new ways to market lobsters and connect with consumers.
June 24, 2020 — The Maine Lobster Marketing Collaborative (MLMC), an industry group aimed at promoting the state’s lobster industry, has released a Maine Lobster Buyer’s Guide, intended for key buyers in the foodservice and retail industries.
The new report, according to MLMC Executive Director Marianne LaCroix, was initially going to be handed out during Seafood Expo North America before COVID-19 forced the event’s cancellation.
February 28, 2020 — The Maine Lobster Marketing Collaborative (MLMC) has released its 2020 strategic plan, which is focused on “promotion, protection, and partnership.”
The MLMC is funded via fees paid by the state’s lobster industry, based on a bill approved by the state’s legislature. The organization’s mission is to promote the U.S. state of Maine’s lobster brand in the media and restaurant business.
May 30, 2019 — The Maine Lobster Marketing Collaborative has announced the creation of a new tool for retailers, distributors, and more to promote lobster, the state’s most valuable seafood product.
The Content Hub, located on the MLMC website, contains logos, infographics, fact-sheets, videos giving details about the industry, high-quality photos, and more. The hub, according to MLMC Executive Director Marianne LaCroix, is intended to aid anyone buying or selling the product and journalists looking for information.
“The Maine Lobster Marketing Collaborative (MLMC) developed its new Content Hub to support the promotional efforts of Maine lobster distributors, foodservice operators, retailers, restauranteurs and anyone selling or promoting Maine lobster worldwide,” she said. “The digital library of assets aims to ensure those buying and selling Maine lobster have a cohesive, easy-to-navigate resource packed with the tools and information needed to both promote and make informed decisions about lobster products.”
June 26, 2018 — It’s 7 a.m. on the Pull n’ Pray. The lobster boat rocks over large swells as the water sparkles in the June morning sun. The grating whirr of the hydraulic winch drowns out the hum of the boat’s motor as it lifts the first lobster trap of the day out of the water. Justin Papkee swings the trap up onto the side of his boat and quickly opens the latch. Suddenly there are lobsters flying through the air.
Mr. Papkee’s blue rubber gloved hand is nearly a blur as he reaches again and again into the open trap, tossing the lobsters back into the water rapid-fire before pulling in the next trap.
Splash. Splash. Splash.
Occasionally he pauses to measure a lobster, or check for a notch or dense clusters of eggs on its tail. After Papkee and his sternman, Jim Ranaghan, have hauled up and sorted through all 16 traps on this line, just one keeper sits in a milk crate on the deck. Then, it’s onto the next set of traps.
This is a worse than average day for the lobsterman, but even on the absolute best days Papkee throws back about half of the lobsters he catches. On those days, he says, it feels like he’s keeping them all by comparison.
Papkee had traveled about 10 miles offshore from Portland to check his traps. It took more than an hour to get to the first of his red and blue buoys. But as he tosses lobster after lobster back into the ocean, Papkee seems unfazed.
“This is just how it’s done,” he says.
Maine has particularly strict rules about which lobsters can be kept. But lobstermen generally don’t resent those laws. In fact, they’re the ones that came up with most of them.
The conservation of natural resources is often portrayed as being in opposition to economic interests, placing the good of the globe over individual livelihoods. But most Maine lobstermen don’t see it that way. They have what has been called a “conservation ethic” that dates back more than a century and has yielded a long list of sustainability rules.
“When you think about this at first glance, it seems crazy. They caught them, why would they want to throw them back?” says Matt Jacobson, executive director of the Maine Lobster Marketing Collaborative. “[The lobstermen] are very mindful of the notion that they are the protectors of the resource.”
This has made Maine lobster one of the world’s most sustainable fisheries. In 2016, the region earned certification from the international Marine Stewardship Council for its “rigorous sustainability requirements,” which have also contributed to a boom the industry is currently experiencing. And with climate change presenting a new challenge for Maine’s iconic lobsters, some researchers say, this commitment to conservation may be more important than ever before.
The duty to protect the resource was ingrained in lobsterman Sonny Beal at just five years old. His father taught him to prioritize the health of the fishery over the weight of his hauls, just like generations before him. He learned to measure lobsters, to check if they were reproductive females, and to notch the tails of any egg-bearing females before throwing them back. Now a lobsterman and father himself, Mr. Beal is teaching his two sons the same.
“I think that we’ve got something really great here and will have something really great for a long time to come because we do take care of it every day,” Beal says. Lobstermen have been passing the tradition of conservation down through generations of sons (and more recently daughters as well) for decades.
Read the full story Christian Science Monitor
June 18, 2018 — A set of retaliatory tariffs released by China on Friday includes a plan to tax American lobster exports, potentially jeopardizing one of the biggest markets for the premium seafood.
Chinese officials announced the planned lobster tariff along with hundreds of other tariffs amid the country’s escalating trade fight with the United States. China said it wants to place new duties on items such as farm products, autos and seafood starting on July 6.
The announcement could have major ramifications for the U.S. seafood industry and for the economy of the state of Maine, which is home to most of the country’s lobster fishery. China’s interest in U.S. lobster has grown exponentially in recent years, and selling to China has become a major focus of the lobster industry.
“Maine’s lobster industry is an irreplaceable piece of our state’s economy that supports thousands of jobs and entire coastal communities,” the state’s congressional delegation said in a statement. “Just two weeks ago, the Maine delegation heard directly from our state’s lobster industry about the economic hardship a trade war with China would cause them.”
The delegation — Republican Sen. Susan Collins, Independent Sen. Angus King; Democratic Rep. Chellie Pingree and Republican Rep. Bruce Poliquin — said they plan to outline their concerns to federal trade officials.
“Hopefully cooler heads can prevail and we can get a solution,” said Matt Jacobson, executive director of the Maine Lobster Marketing Collaborative. “It’s a year round customer in China. This isn’t good news at all.”