Mac Fisheries

Mac Fisheries was a branded United Kingdom retail chain of fishmongers, founded by William Lever, 1st Viscount Leverhulme, the co-founder with his brother of Lever Brothers, which later merged to become Unilever.

In his thirties, Lord Leverhulme had taken a boat trip and fallen in love with the Western Isles of Scotland. In May 1918, at the age of 66, he bought the Isle of Lewis for £167,000. Convinced that he could resurrect the fishing industry, he set about investing in all aspects of the supporting industries and supply/distribution chain.

Leverhulme's plan was to build an ice-making plant in Stornoway, building refrigerated cargo ships to take fish to a depot at Fleetwood, where he would build herring-curing facilities, a canning factory and a plant installed to make fish cakes, fish paste, glue, animal feed and fertiliser. To create a market for the fish, he began to buy up independent fishmongers throughout Britain, rebranding them Mac Fisheries.

But in 1919, servicemen demobilised from World War I and promised land, started occupying plots on the Isle of Lewis. Leverhulme protested and took legal action against the people he considered squatters, but the Scottish Office took the side of the ex-servicemen, leaving Leverhulme's plan in tatters. Leverhulme announced that he would leave Lewis in 1923, offering to gift the Isle to the locals. But suspicion ran so high, that he was forced to sell again to long-term absentee landlords.

In late 1919, Leverhulme purchased the South Harris estate from the Earl of Dunmore for the sum of £36,000. Taking in the Western Isles fishing village of Obbe, he planned to turn it into a consolidated major fishing centre, with product distributed through the Mac Fisheries shops. In 1920, Obbe with local consent was rebranded Leverburgh, and 300 men started work on a new pier and seashore infrastructure for processing the product from 50 berthed trawlers. Shore side construction covered an accommodation block, curing sheds, smoke houses, a refrigeration building, store sheds, houses for the managers and a 20 car garage.

With a second stage of development planned that would have seen the inner sea loch converted into a harbour to accommodate 200+ trawlers, fitted with a sea lock to ensure a constant 25 feet (7.6 m) depth, Leverhulme paid for upgraded roads to accommodate the additional traffic. After purchasing the London butchers Wall's in 1920, the economic downturn of 1920–21 slowed development, resulting in the London-based Mac Fisheries being incorporated into Lever Brothers Ltd in 1922. By 1924 Leverburgh was ready to start production, and 12 Great Yarmouth drifters landed a quantity of herring so great, that extra female employees were taken in from the mainland to handle the catch.

After what was to be his last visit to Leverburgh in September 1924, Leverhulme took a trip to Africa, where he developed pneumonia. After his death in Hampstead, his executors and the board of Lever Brothers had no interest in the project and so ended all work, selling off village and production facilities for £5,000, and estate for £300. It is estimated the project cost Leverhulme £500,000.

In 1930, a merger of the major palm oil consumers, the British soapmaker Lever Brothers and Dutch margarine producer Margarine Unie, created the foods conglomerate known as Unilever. The company's main focus was overseas expansion by distribution of its manufactured foods products outside its two core markets. The company allowed its in-country operations considerable independence, as long as they made a profit. The head office of Mac Fisheries Ltd was at Ocean House, Pudding Lane, London EC3; its emblem was a roundel in blue and white showing the Scottish saltire with four fish between its arms and the motto "For all fish".