In Gloucester, Virginia, Matheson Oyster Co. is a female-owned farm is pushing to preserve a working waterfront
If Sarah Matheson-Harris was a betting woman, she would never have hit the odds that she’d be farming oysters one day. “I was a portrait painter turned marketer turned advertiser turned oyster farm owner, so somewhere along the way, I was definitely bamboozled a little bit,” she says. “But I love it. Oysters keep you tied to a place, emotionally and physically.”
She and her husband, Eric, went through a lot in their 20s. “I’m an only child, and both of my parents became ill, and they ended up passing away one month apart from each other,” Sarah says. She’d grown up in Gloucester, Virginia, where her father had a small oyster garden at the end of their family dock. It was a running joke that Sarah would one day start an oyster farm with him. At their passing, Sarah says she and Eric faced a decision: Continue on with grad school and move toward a career in advertising? Or take a risk on a more meaningful life? “You go through what is the worst possible thing you could go through, facing your biggest nightmare, and I think you become almost fearless.”
Like many other Southern, family-run oyster farms, what started small, with Sarah and Eric growing oysters while working in other jobs, she says, “quickly snowballed. The next thing we knew, we were purchasing an off-market piece of a working waterfront. It was one of those moments where we said, we’re gonna do it and we’re gonna do it big.” Sarah is the sole owner while Eric serves as the CEO and Eric’s brother Cory is the farm manager . While they started dabbling in 2017, the farm officially launched in 2022.
Matheson sells three different varieties of oysters: Wavelengths, Birthday Girls, and Bonfires—and true to her creative and marketing background, Sarah has a story for each. The Birthday Girls’ might be her favorite: “Gloucester is the Daffodil Capital of America; we have an annual festival, we elect a Daffodil Queen, there’s a parade. And my mom was actually a certified daffodil judge, traveling to different flower shows up and down the East Coast. When I was little, she chose the variety of daffodil called Birthday Girls to be our signature flower to grow together as mother and daughter.” Bonfires, meanwhile, are best when placed over a fire and grilled. And Wavelengths get their name from the natural wave action that tumbles their oysters in Mobjack Bay, which opens up into the Chesapeake.
As a 30-something female owner of an oyster business, Sarah stands apart. “It’s a male-dominated industry and some people didn’t think I’d have the guts to stick it out,” she says. But the challenge empowers her, especially in her role as the company’s salesperson. “It might take people by surprise but I think it’s also what makes us stand out.” She also leans into applying her creativity to a marine science business. “I’m constantly trying to use creativity in ways that will surprise and delight our customers so that they’ll want to eat more oysters.”
And while farming what she lovingly calls “pet rocks,” she and her family are also doing their part to preserve an essential element of the Chesapeake Bay: a working waterfront. “To have a working waterfront is a core piece of an aquaculture business, and they are disappearing very fast,” she says. “Conservation is a moral contract. It is our responsibility to do all that we can to protect these resources and to make these resources, and the community around us, better.”
“I got into this because I wanted to keep a foothold here, to bring more business to my community, and to feel an emotional connection, day in and day out, to my parents,” she says. “Mission accomplished,” she adds with a laugh. “It’s definitely been a wild ride.”
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Erin Byers Murray
Erin Byers Murray has been digging into stories about food and wine for more than twenty years. Based in Nashville, she is the editor-in-chief of The Local Palate and has authored or co-authored half a dozen books, including deep dives into oysters and grits, as well as several cookbooks. Her work has been published in multiple publications, including Food & Wine, Wine & Spirits, the Boston Globe, and three editions of Best Food Writing.