Tag Archives: Chuck Bundrant
Trident Seafoods’ Chuck Bundrant, a pioneer of U.S. fisheries off Alaska, dies at 79
Chuck Bundrant, an epic figure in North Pacific fisheries who started his career as a deck hand on a crabber and went on to cofound Seattle-based Trident Seafoods, died Sunday at his Edmonds home. He was 79. Bundrant was a fierce competitor who played a pivotal role in ushering in a new era in harvests off Alaska as foreign fleets were pushed out of the 200-mile zone and Americans rushed in to catch pollock, crab, black cod and other seafood. And as U.S. fleets gained control, he fought to ensure that Trident’s network of shoreside processing plants and seagoing vessels would prosper. >click to read< 08:02
Seafood Billionaire Donates To Trump
In the southwest corner of Alaska, next to a line of islands that point across the Bering Sea, sits Bristol Bay, home to one of the most plentiful salmon runs on earth. Nearly 20 years ago, a Canadian company named Northern Dynasty Minerals, started planning for a gold and copper mine nearby, which it has said would create jobs. While the Canadian company was eager to extract riches from the ground, Chuck Bundrant, the billionaire founder of Trident Seafoods was apparently concerned about how the mine would affect his ability to extract riches from the sea. “It poses a significant risk to the many families, businesses, and communities that rely upon the natural resources of Bristol Bay,” >click to read< 13:29
Untouched salmon
The future of commercial salmon processing will go online in Norway later this year when the machines take over a plant just north of the Arctic Circle. If the operation proves successful – and there is every indication it will – Alaska should get ready to see yet another radical change in the labor-intensive business that helped shape the territory and fire the push for Statehood in the 1950s. click here to read the story 09:25
The Man Who Got Americans to Eat Trash Fish Is Now a Billionaire
Chuck Bundrant was a college freshman with $80 in his pocket when he drove halfway across the country to Seattle to earn a few bucks fishing. The year was 1961. He hasn’t stopped fishing since. And today, Bundrant, the founder and majority owner of Trident Seafoods, is worth at least $1.1 billion, according to the Bloomberg Billionaires Index.,,, Chuck Bundrant’s story is the stuff of industry legend. “He knew nothing about fishing boats, or catching and processing crab and salmon,’’ son Joe said in a corporate video two years ago. “He’d only watched a movie with John Wayne in it called ‘North to Alaska.’ And he heard there was money to be made on the fishing grounds, thousands and thousands of miles from home.’’ After a few years, Bundrant was looking for a way to start a business in the industry. He met two other crab fishermen — Kaare Ness and Mike Jacobson — and in 1973 the three put their money together and built the Billikin, a 135-foot boat that changed the seafood industry, according to Trident’s corporate history. click here to read the story 19:06
