Castine, Maine, U.S.A.-based BlueTrace, a traceability solution for shellfish harvesters, growers, distributors, and dealers, has announced 133 percent growth over the past year.
The company offers a tagging, traceability, and compliance solution designed for the shellfish industry allowing producers to quickly tag products with traceability information. The tags, and the logs kept, are designed to comply with relevant federal, state, and provincial laws, according to the company.
The company announced that in a year, the company went from 150 clients to over 350 producers and distributors across “an expanding platform” of species. It added that on the west coast of Canada, the British Columbia Shellfish Growers Association is now covering 95 percent of the cost of BlueTrace for its producers and processors.
"The growers in our BlueTrace Technology Adoption program are enjoying the benefits provided by their solution,” BCSFA Executive Director Nico Prins said in a release. “Now we're excited to expand adoption up the supply chain to processors at a time when traceability requirements are becoming more rigorous."
The product is also getting uptake on the U.S. East Coast, according to Blue Trace. The company has relationships with Samuels Seafood, Denarius Trading, and others.
BlueTrace emerged out of OysterTracker, a piece of software BlueTrace CEO Chip Terry launched in 2018. The original iteration of the program was based on a passion project of Terry’s designed to help out oyster farmers in Maine.
The changeover to BlueTrace happened in 2021, after the company said it had begun to see clients outside the oyster industry.
“Over the last couple of years, the Oyster Tracker name began reaching its limits. Although the bulk of our business is oysters, we have a ton of other shellfish going through our platform. Our fastest-growing solutions are all-around traceability,” the company said at the time.
BlueTrace said it continues to focus on the traceability part of the industry, and said it is aware of and plans to comply with the final food traceability rules of the U.S. Food and Drug Administration’s Food Safety Modernization Act.
“For example, all producers and distributors can now assign an uneditable traceability lot code as required by Section 204 of the Food Safety Modernization Act,” the company said.
Terry said the company is continuing to expand into more regions, and it recently visited operations in the U.S. state of Virginia to “understand their unique needs."
“Our efforts this year on both the east and west coasts prove the need for seafood tagging and traceability across the United States and Canada,” Terry said. “As our business grows, we’re seeing significant traction with organizations big and small to optimize their activities, comply with regulations, and keep up with their inventory.”
Photo courtesy of BlueTrace
