WHAT STARTED AS AN idea BORN DURING THE COVID-19 PANDEMIC HAS TURNED Fishwife INTO ONE OF THE most viral food brands IN THE COUNTRY.

Co-founded by Becca Millstein, the company has reimagined tinned seafood as something vibrant, design-conscious, and irresistible—earning with products like their smoked salmon, trout, and tuna flying off supermarket shelves. By combining sustainably sourced fish with bold packaging and clever recipes, Millstein has helped introduce a new generation of consumers to a pantry staple generations old.

In the midst of Fishwife’s rapid growth, Millstein remains deeply connected to her “why.” She shares with us the “aha” moment that sparked Fishwife, the realities of scaling a breakout brand, and how she’s leading a brand that’s growing faster than the speed of light. Read about Becca Millstein’s journey in her C&C 100 interview below.

What are some of your earliest memories of food that still bring you joy? Did it center around the holidays, or were you regularly helping your family out with everyday meals?

Our extended family shares a lakehouse on Lake George in upstate New York that my grandparents bought in the 70s. It’s a very lodge-y, humble little house, but it has a big, wooden family room with a big window overlooking the lake. The centerpiece of the room is a long wooden table. My favorite food memories are waking up to the sounds and smells of my parents making coffee, my siblings toasting english muffins, smearing maple butter and jam. and joining them to eat this simple meal in the sunlight room by the lake.

When did you realize there was a void in the tinned fished market in the U.S. that wasn’t being filled?

It hit me on a hike during COVID, when it just felt so obvious—tinned fish is this inherently incredible product: it’s delicious, nutrient-dense, shelf-stable… and yet in the U.S. it had been positioned as this kind of sad, utilitarian commodity. Meanwhile, in Europe, it’s beautiful and celebratory. That disconnect made me feel like, why hasn’t anyone reintroduced this in a way that actually reflects how good it is (and how much better it makes your life)?

Fishwife’s popularity has taken off tremendously over the past year. What’s a surprisingly challenging aspect that comes with this new phase of the business?

I heard Jesse from Good Culture say, “Growth breaks things before it builds them” and that couldn’t be truer. When you really hit product / market fit and word of mouth / repurchase takes over any amount of marketing you could do, it’s near impossible to keep up with the space of growth. Out of stocks, overworked team members, strained capacity at every point in the value chain—these are the extremely painful and somehow essentially inevitable symptoms of a successful high growth business.

“Out of stocks, overworked team members, strained capacity at every point in the value chain—these are the extremely painful and somehow essentially inevitable symptoms of a successful high growth business.”

Can you walk me through your creative process of developing a new product or flavor? Where do your best ideas come from?

Honestly some of the best product ideas come from our community, what people are doing with Fishwife on social, what they're requesting, what they're pairing us with. The constraint we always work within is: does this work in a tin, can we source it to our standards, and does it feel

How do you want people to feel when they first try a Fishwife product?

Surprised. And then immediately comfortable, like, why haven't I been eating this my whole life? I want that 'where has this been' feeling. Tinned fish has centuries of tradition behind it; we're just finally giving American consumers the gateway into it."

What’s an adjective that best describes the phase your business is in right now?

Sprinting. We're in a moment where growth is happening faster than we can fully explain, the brand has taken on a life of its own, and the job is just to keep up with it. It's exhilarating and humbling at the same time. You're building the plane while flying it, and the runway keeps getting longer.

What is the one go-to ingredient in your pantry or fridge that you must have on hand at all times?

Besides tinned fish? Kewpie mayo. For reasons you can probably imagine (I am def squirting directly in a tin of tuna, salmon, trout, etc. more times per week I'd probably admit publicly).

What’s a dish someone could create with a Fishwife product that looks like you tried hard, but is secretly very simple?

Tinned fish pasta. You sauté some garlic and shallots, deglaze with white wine, fold in a tin of our smoked albacore or wild-caught salmon, toss with pasta and a little pasta water, finish with lemon and herbs. It looks and tastes like you spent an hour on it. It takes fifteen minutes and uses ingredients that live in your pantry indefinitely.