There were some watering eyes at Big Fisherman Seafood, and it wasn’t because of any spice in the boil.
The Magazine Street seafood market has been shuttered since Hurricane Ida hit in August. Now, proprietor Henry Poynot has decided to close Big Fisherman permanently after 32 years in business here.
Big Fisherman Seafood got its start on Magazine Street in 1989 selling fresh and cooked seafood and Louisiana staples. (Staff photo by Ian McNulty, Nola.com | The Times-Picayune)
Poynot was clearing out supplies and mementos that had accumulated over the years, and he broke the news to longtime customers and neighbors as they passed by on a busy holiday shopping weekend. Some shed tears over the change.
“You think about people who worked here and the customers through the years, that’s what kept me here after I probably should have closed years back,” he said. “I’ve been through Katrina, I’ve lost houses. But this is the hardest thing, moving on from this now.”
Henry Poynot talks with a customer passing by on Magazine Street at his market Big Fisherman Seafood. (Staff photo by Ian McNulty, Nola.com | The Times-Picayune)
It is the latest loss of a longtime local business on this stretch of Magazine Street. Earlier this month, the owners of the Harry’s Ace Hardware store just a few blocks up the street announced that they intend close this spring. That will mark the end of a business first started in 1910, and which has been on Magazine Street since 1958.
After more than a century, Harry's Ace Hardware, an Uptown landmark on Magazine Street for most of its business life, is calling it quits.
The Harry’s Ace owners attributed their decision to competition from online retailers and big box stores.
At Big Fisherman, the business of selling fresh and cooked seafood and Louisiana specialties had been gradually trailing off for years. Long gone were the days when Poynot kept a full case of local fin fish for his neighborhood clientele.
“Times are changing, the mom and pop on the corner is going away,” Poynot lamented.
An old sign lists items at Big Fisherman Seafood, which got its start on Magazine Street in 1989 selling fresh and cooked seafood and Louisiana staples. (Staff photo by Ian McNulty, Nola.com | The Times-Picayune)
The increasing popularity of boiled crawfish kept the doors open, but he said it was difficult to make money outside of crawfish season.
Even with crawfish though, competition has grown more intense.
“There are supermarkets that will sell it boiled for less than I could afford to sell it live,” he said.
The shop missed much of the 2020 crawfish season, remaining closed through the first eight months of the pandemic. It re-opened with only limited hours.
The cost of lost inventory after Ida proved to be the last straw, Poynot said, echoing a number of other local food businesses that similarly shuttered for good after the hurricane.
Poynot owns the building at the corner of Magazine and Toledano streets. He said he does not yet know what he will do with the property next.
Big Fisherman Seafood got its start on Magazine Street in 1989 selling fresh and cooked seafood and Louisiana staples. (Staff photo by Ian McNulty, Nola.com | The Times-Picayune)
A Chalmette native, Poynot got his start in the business as a teenager, fishing after school and shrimping at night on progressively larger boats.
In the 1980s, he and a business partner teamed up to start a market called Little Fisherman in Chalmette. They opened a second location in St. Bernard Parish and in 1989 expanded to Magazine Street with a third, taking over a market that had been called Uptown Seafood.
Henry Poynot talks with a customer passing by on Magazine Street at his market Big Fisherman Seafood. (Staff photo by Ian McNulty, Nola.com | The Times-Picayune)
After Poynot and his partner parted ways, he kept The New Orleans location and renamed it Big Fisherman.
Some customers know his employees better than him. Connie Malaro had worked here for decades, so had Michael Robinson, Poynot’s nephew.
A hand-written sign from a young customer reads "We miss you" at Big Fisherman Seafood, a seafood market on Magazine Street. (Staff photo by Ian McNulty, Nola.com | The Times-Picayune)
Over 32 years in business here, Poynot can recall customers he met as children who are now doctors and lawyers. He even recalls a youthful shoplifter who, as an adult, became one of his better customers.
“He stole a bag of peanuts off the counter, I chased him down Magazine Street, I told him if you need something you don’t steal, you ask me,” he recalled.
People have been bringing Poynot more conventional requests through the years - for cooking advice, for specialty meats like alligator sausage, for the lead blocks and oyster knives for shucking a sack at home.
Henry Poynot has been fishing since he was a kid growing up in Chalmette and opened his Big Fisherman Seafood on Magazine Street in 1989. (Staff photo by Ian McNulty, Nola.com | The Times-Picayune)
Now 60, Poynot knows it’s time for him to move on, but that’s been a difficult decision to digest.
“It’s hard coming here and talking to our old customers,” he said. “ it really has been a pleasure doing this and being part of their lives.”
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