About Us

At Frank's, the Ultimate Seafood Market, we're obsessed with freshness! Family owned and operated since 1946, our mission is to offer seafood lovers the freshest, highest quality seafood available. This obsession with freshness and quality is a family tradition passed down by several generations.

In the early 1900s, Frank’s mother, Catherine Mattes, the oldest of ten children, began selling oysters in Canton. By 1920, with eight children of her own to support, she expanded to making fresh crab cakes, crab soup, as well as other delicious seafood and wild game dishes. Her son, Frank, even recalls going door-to-door with his brothers selling oysters and crab cakes for 25 cents each. Catherine’s growing business was one of the first to be granted a beer license in Baltimore City!

After his Army days during World War II, Catherine’s son, Frank, started Reliable Seafood in 1946, a fresh seafood delivery service with routes into Pennsylvania.

Frank took on the name, Frank’s Seafood, in 1960 after buying a stall in the old downtown Baltimore Wholesale Fish Market, now a historic landmark. Frank’s four daughters worked in the family business through the years. Now it is owned and operated by one daughter, Joanne, and her daughter Lauren.

The business relocated to the new Maryland Wholesale Seafood Center in Jessup in 1984. This calculated move to the U.S. distribution point for the entire Mid-Atlantic affords Frank’s Seafood the ability to purchase and restock their fresh seafood daily. At Frank’s, we go beyond the U.S. recommended seafood quality checks, further supporting our obsession with freshness! We check our fresh fishes’ temperatures at several points before giving it our stamp of approval. An added benefit is our ability to honor special requests for most items from any place in the world! At Frank’s, our customers enjoy the Ultimate in seafood choices and quality!

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