A FISHMONGERS has launched a new nationwide home delivery service, promising ocean to plate locally in a day to cater to shifting seafood consumer habits.

Fish at Home, by Brighton and Newhaven Fish Sales (BNFS), will deliver fresh seafood to doorsteps across Sussex and the rest of the country after the 50-year-old business identified a shift in demand for such a service during lockdown.

BNFS, known locally as Fish, said enforced restrictions for covid and concerns over the freshness and sustainability of fish in supermarkets have combined to shift consumer habits.

Company director Kier Foster said the company had to pivot to maintain sales and protect the livelihoods not only of its staff but the Sussex fishermen and women who had come to rely on their distribution network since it was founded half a century ago.

He said: “Home delivery was the clear solution for us. Not only was this ensuring the survival of our own business and the fishing fleets, but also that people could still have local and seasonal fish as part of their diet.

“The response and subsequent demand for the service was incredible.”

Doorstep delivery reached 500 boxes in a single week in 2020 and now the company claims customers are asking for a continuation of the home delivery fishmonger.

Mr Foster said: “Fish is something people want to eat completely fresh and we know, from research and from what customers tell us, that they want to know that the fish they’re eating hasn’t been sat in storage for two weeks.

“The pandemic has clearly changed consumer habits in all sorts of ways and I think that includes how we want to buy and consume seafood.

“We have simply had to respond to what the customer now wants.”

The company will deliver “freshness-guaranteed” fish to people’s homes with an offer that will also tap into demand for sustainable catches.

One of Fish at Home’s products, Sussex Catch Export Box, will give seafood fans a selection of fish caught in local waters, such as dab, flounder and huss, that are usually exported because of a lack of demand in UK markets.