The Pacific Northwest’s salmon fishermen faced a crisis. Starting in the early 2000s, cheap Chilean farmed salmon flooded the country, driving down prices for locally sourced, sustainably managed wild fish.

“The West Coast fishermen were no longer able to compete in their traditional high-volume market,” says Fishermen’s News publisher Peter Phillips.

The crisis threatened more than fishermen and their families; fishing is the economic mainstay of many of Washington’s native tribes and other coastal communities.

Enter Washington Sea Grant. Skilled marine field agent Steve Harbell and other WSG staffers have long trained seafood retailers in fish handling and marketing, and taught consumers to be smarter, safer, and more confident seafood shoppers. Now WSG set out to strengthen another link in the seafood supply chain: the embattled fishermen.

Pete Granger, WSG’s seafood industry specialist, was especially well prepared for the challenge. As a teenager growing up on Washington’s Lummi Island, Granger had taken up the ancient technique of reef-net salmon fishing devised by local tribes. After a stint in the 1970s as a WSG field agent, he earned a master’s in business administration, managed a salmon cannery and processing plant in Alaska, led the American High Seas Fisheries Association, and worked as a lobbyist for both wild and farm fisheries.

Harbell and Granger together applied their wealth of contacts and experience to the salmon fleets’ struggle. They helped fishermen from Oregon to Alaska obtain federal trade adjustment assistance, refine their business operations, upgrade their catches’ quality, and market them directly to restaurants and retailers, boosting their margins and building brand cachet.

For the last decade, Granger has helped Phillips stage the Wild Seafood Exchange, an innovative annual conference where fishermen network with each other and with restaurateurs, retailers, and other key customers, and get expert training in marketing and business management.