Today we’d like to introduce you to Jeffrey Mazza.
Jeffrey, please share your story with us. How did you get to where you are today?
I am from a town called Andover, Massachusetts. My father has had a seafood processing plant for over 50 years, so we grew up in the industry.
After graduating from Cushing Academy I went on to study finance at the University of Massachusetts – Amherst. I always wanted to be in finance. I had internships and worked in Boston after graduating. I then moved to Chicago and worked at UBS Investment Bank in the investment grade corporate bond desk.
Every time I would visit my family in Boston, I was always going right for that fresh seafood. You can smell that ocean as soon as you walk off the plane. After awhile, that’s when I realized we needed to bring that superior quality seafood to Chicago.
We decided to start to sell seafood wholesale. We would go door to door at restaurants/bars/clubs, etc looking for buyers of our product. We started to accumulate customers which was great. We then needed a home base a fish market & restaurant.
We founded the spot on Lincoln Avenue. It had everything we were looking for, so we decided to jump on the spot.
After opening our fish market & restaurant concept in September 2011, Steve Dolinsky from the ABC’s Hungry Hound ate our lobster roll and did a segment on us, then Check Please, Chicago’s Best, 190 North and countless articles. We were very honored to be a part of those shows that our guests recommended us to. It was a humbling experience.
Since those shows aired, we realized that our fish market & restaurant concept turned into a restaurant with a small fish market. Our place evolved into a full service restaurant.
We’re always bombarded by how great it is to pursue your passion, etc – but we’ve spoken with enough people to know that it’s not always easy. Overall, would you say things have been easy for you?
Along the way, we definitely had some road blocks and obstacles. This was not an easy path to take. Every day was a new learning experience for us.
After transforming into a full service restaurant, we had to learn a ton! We were not prepared for all the ins and outs of a restaurant. We had the superior products, but ordering, budgets, scheduling, recipe cards, there was so much that we learned and still learning today.
Thanks to our wonderful customers that keep coming back and a ton of networks that I met and learned so much from.
So let’s switch gears a bit and go into the New England Seafood Company Restaurant story. Tell us more about the business.
Growing up on the shores of Massachusetts, we would ALWAYS eat at all the lobster shacks after we spent the day at the beaches. My family and I always loved that time together.
Our company is a New England Style lobster shack. We want to bring our guests the same experience we had growing up on the coasts. We operate a very casual, family oriented, fun experience. While we are not on the Atlantic Ocean, we want our guests to have a wonderful experience when they come to our restaurant.
Our specialty is our lobster roll. This is hands down the closest roll you’ll get outside of Boston. We ship our buns in from Boston to keep our authenticity. Lobster is so sweet and succulent as it is, so we don’t use a lot of fillers or mayo. We let the seafood do the talking. We’re very lucky enough to have a publication vote us #1 in Chicago and that is very humbling to us.
We like to think that we’re different not only by serving some of the freshest superior quality seafood, but having a casual family fun time. Just like the way we grew up. Have fun, share some laughs. We want our guests to think they’re in New England when they’re here.
Has luck played a meaningful role in your life and business?
Luck is definitely a double edge sword if you will. Both good and bad luck.
We have had bit of both. Luck always plays a part of business and life. The good times, isn’t as good, if you don’t have the bad.
Learning is the key. Never stop learning and trying to improve from the previous day is what we’re trying to do day in and day out.
Contact Info:
- Address: 3341 North Lincoln Avenue
- Website: www.neseafoodcompany.com
- Phone: 773-871-3474 (FISH)
- Email: fishmarket@neseafoodcompany.com
- Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/neseafood/
