Hyttel’s smokehouse is a small salmon smokehouse in Hjørring, Denmark. Today they would normally have sent two-tree pallets of salmon to Italy, but could only send half a pallet of salmon.
“Everything is affected by the fact that the fish stores in Italy are closed,” says Poul Jørgensen, CEO of Hyttels Røgeri.
Hyttels Røgeri is a family-run company for soon four generations, where Poul Jørgensen is married to third generation Lone Hyttels, and their son Palle Hyttel is also part of the company. The company was founded in 1929, when a small fish store with an associated smokehouse was founded.
SalmonBusiness was already in contact with the smokehouse earlier this week, where Poul Jørgensen foresaw that there was going to be a large decrease in sales in the end of the week, though he had not expected to be so badly affected.
“We sell almost nothing to Italy. And we have no idea when things will normalise in Italy,” says Poul Jørgensen worried.
The situation in Italy is still uncertain, with the whole country closed down and all smaller shops equally. Only two things keep Poul Jørgensens hopes up: that the price of Norwegian salmon will fall next week, as they expect it will be difficult to sell.
“We expect there will be pressure on the price of Norwegian salmon next week. But it is impossible to foresee right now,” he says.
In addition, the company hopes that the demand from supermarkets will increase as salmon cant be eaten or bought in restaurants and fish stores.
The company has a total of 15 employees and an annual turnover of EUR 3.4 million. This week, the company’s revenue has been halved.
“We hope, we in some way can tackle it. We are trying to be optimistic in this crazy situation we have never been in before,” he concludes.
