PORTLAND, Maine — Maine officials have convinced Holland America cruise line to purchase locally caught lobsters for its cruise ships when they visit Bar Harbor several times this season.
The first delivery from the Trenton Bridge Lobster Pound takes place when the Maasdam visits Friday.
WNSX-FM says the collaborative efforts of a Bar Harbor councilor, state senator, lobster pound owner and Cruise Maine is independent of efforts of Rep. Chellie Pingree, who’s also urging the cruise ships that bring tens of thousands of visitors to Portland to serve locally caught lobsters.
The Democrat announced Monday that she had sent a letter to the owners of 15 cruise ship lines that visit the state suggesting that buy Maine lobster.
This is great! i hope more plans like this work to help our lobstermen, they work hard and deserve to make a good living.
I have never meet a Poor Fisherman yet.
That’s because they don’t carry debt. Our next door neighbor lobsterman and his wife are two of the hardest working people I have ever met.
This is the way Maine should work, good for you Ms. Pingree!
Ummm sea insects.
Let’s hope it goes a step further and these cruise lines purchase Maine lobster to offer on their ships around the globe, not just those in Maine waters. Foreigners like lobster tails.
I’m not a Pingree Fan but Certainly she deserves credit for a great strategic idea that will benefit everyone!
I agree.
So what do all the nay-sayers, who like you are not her fans, and who bad mouthed her for writing to all the cruise ship lines, in the comments on first article about this, deserve ?
See, this wasn’t so hard now was it ? I just hope the idea of provisioning a whole ship is possible and looked into. A lot of Maine farm’s, cattle, poultry and lamb folk’s could all benefit from this type opportunity.
Very cool! Not that I’m planning a cruise soon (or ever) but if I do, I’ll remember this :)
awesome! These cruise ships have been cutting off lobster gear for years. Now the lobstermen can finally BENEFIT from their visits! Good work, all who helped this to happen!!
Good for Rep. Chellie Pingree and Maine lobster men. She saw an opening and dived right in. She got it to work in Portland and now in Bar Harbor.
That’s a legislator at work.
So let’s get this straight, all is good now that Trenton Bridge can load a cruise boat. As a gambling man I would take lots of odds that, Cubbby (Trenton Bridge) will do quite well with the hook up and continue to pass along a glut price to his fisherman as no one wants our lobster. LMAO . Its a joke.
Agreed. The lobstermen are still getting the bottom price while Trenton Bridge profits from this. And not to say that lobsters from Bar Harbor are better than any other town, but they’re advertising to the cruise ships that the lobsters they are receiving are from Bar Harbor – which they’re not, they’re from whoever Cubby buys from (all of MDI and Hancock County I imagine)… Not to say that I don’t appreciate the effort, but the only way this will help the lobstermen is if the cruise ships buy from them direcly and elminate the middle man.