We recently connected with Sean Huggard and have shared our conversation below.

Sean, thanks for taking the time to share your stories with us today So, what do you think about family businesses? Would you want your children or other family members to one day join your business?

When I was a kid my father and his father were in the used car business. I spent a lot of my childhood at the car lots washing cars, sweeping dirt and horsing around. I learned to drive a stick shift truck in the back of his parking lot as soon as my feet could touch the pedals. I guess at some point as a child I just assumed that I would follow in the footsteps of my dad, my mother on the other hand had a different idea. She didn’t want me working those hours, she wanted me to have a higher education, and she wanted me to see more. Turns out I got that higher education, I’ve gotten to see the world, I get to work with amazing people, I get to lead a team every day and I get to make peoples lives better even if it’s just for a moment while they’re in the restaurant.. The downside is I still work just as many hours…….. There are times I feel like I missed out on getting to work in my family business with a 50+ year history, I often think it would’ve been quite the experience to work hand-in-hand with my dad, I believe I could have added new generational energy and grew the business. Although I’m not selling cars or running a mechanic shop I do still feel like I’m in the family business of being an entrepreneur and servicing our customer

With my own growing business and my growing family of three children, I hope I’m afforded the opportunity to work with at least one of them- if they choose to have hospitality culinary arts, design or leadership is a part of their future.

The reason I do what I do every day is to be a part of something bigger than oneself, to leave something behind, to have something that will continue in and it would be great to be able to hand this to my family to take it to the next level.

Great, appreciate you sharing that with us. Before we ask you to share more of your insights, can you take a moment to introduce yourself and how you got to where you are today to our readers

My name is Sean Huggard and I am the Chef Owner of Blue Island Oyster Bar and Seafood, we currently have two locations in Colorado, One in Denver and One in Lone Tree. I own this business with my wife Jennifer and my partners Jim Gregory and Oyster Farmer Chris Quartuccio. We have an oyster farm, hatchery and an oyster dive team that that raises, farms and dives for our oysters in Long Island NY.

We serve traditional New England Style seafood and oysters in a relaxed upscale environment. We position ourselves as being an escape from the norm, a trip away an experience to remember.

The brand is a reflection of my upbringing in New England and being a chef on Cape Cod and Nantucket Island as well as it’s influenced by the small fishing communities in and throughout the northeastern coast

We’d love to hear about you met your business partner.

I met my business partner Chris Quartuccio who is an oyster farmer wholesaler from Long Island New York for the first time at the Boston seafood show over 10 years ago. I had been buying oysters in many restaurants from his company for many many years but never met him only his sales force. Over a cold beer I had expressed to him my interest in opening but at the time I refer to as a “real” ..oyster bar in Denver Colorado on the flipside of that conversation Chris expressed to me his interest in growing his brands into the restaurant world but made it very clear he had no desire to operate the restaurant and/or create this concept in his home state of New York as to not compete against his loyal customer base in New York City and to be cliché the rest is history.. After that conversation we immediately started digging into what neighborhood in Denver Colorado was the right neighborhood to bring fresh oysters and New England seafood to life.. We landed on Cherry Creek for a first location and have been operating ever since this relationship has allowed us to train all of our managers and many of our staff members at the hatchery and at the farm in New York and Chris is constantly visiting us along with other oyster farmers from across the country here in Denver for staff trainings Without that first meeting in Boston Colorado would be short a few Oyster Bars. I would not have done it any other way- Chris has given us an insight into the Oyster business that no other restauranteur has access too- we have access to the best and freshest oysters prior to anyone else..

Can you share a story from your journey that illustrates your resilience?

I think resilience is the word that may best define people in the restaurant industry over the past year. .When COVID-19 hit Colorado and we were forced to shut our doors, myself, my staff and most other people thought that the 30 day timeline on being closed was most realistic. As we know now, it was far from that. This is where resilience kicked in. With mortgages, rent and payroll needing to be paid, employees needing to work, and people needing to be fed, I had to be more resilient than I had ever before. I immediately made a decision to adjust my restaurant brand into something more casual that would work better for to go, pick up and delivery. I created a neighborhood liquor store so people didn’t have to make two stops while out and we partnered with local hospitals and turned our dinning room into a catering facility at night putting together well over 1000 meals a day. All this allowed us to bring back employees and keep managers on payroll which in return gave us the steam to continue to pivot through the changes of COVID-19 that were forced upon our industry and gave us the strength and energy to keep moving forward, keep adapting and even to expand during this chaotic time

Contact Info:

• Website: blueislandoysterbar.com
• Instagram: blueislandoysterbar