Going the extra mile
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Max Stocks has its roots in seafood, but now stocks a broad range of other food categories
When your business serves some of the most remote corners of north Queensland, you need a certain nimbleness to ride out the unique challenges posed by the region’s tropical environment. And that’s certainly something Max Stocks has developed in spades, after 70 years of supplying seafood to local fish and chip businesses in the early years to now being the largest independently, locally owned food distribution business in North Queensland.
Founded in 1954 by Max Stocks himself, the business was bought by the Fisher family in 1980, who are still at the helm today.
“It started off as pure seafood and they had a couple of seafood retail shops as well,” says Russell Fisher, second generation managing director. “They moved into slicing fish and crumbing prawn cutlets and fish and slowly branched into food service”
Family first
Some of Russell Fisher’s earliest memories are of helping his parents Ken and Sally, and grandmother Kay, with Max Stocks work. “I’d be out on delivery runs or sitting at the kitchen table on a weeknight with mum helping her sort through 100 resumes for drivers,” Russell recalls. “If they had a forklift or truck licence, I’d put them in a file and if they didn’t, I’d put them in another file.”
He always knew his future was with Max Stocks but his parents had a firm rule – any family member who wanted to join the business had to get a degree or apprenticeship first. “I did an apprenticeship as a mechanic but once I got my ticket, I came to Max Stocks driving trucks and working in the warehouse,” Russell recalls.
Russell took the helm of Max Stocks in 2017, with a clear vision for growth both within their fresh seafood speciality and into other categories.
“In the past three years, we’ve doubled our staff to 100, built a bigger warehouse freezer at our Cairns headquarters, and purchased a warehouse facility in Townsville,” he says. “We joined Countrywide in 2018, which has enabled us to be more competitive and maintain accounts or take some of the accounts off our national competitors. We’ve become the sole Streets Ice-cream distributor for Far North Queensland.”
Russell Fisher grew up helping his parents run Max Stocks. Now he’s at the helm, overseeing extraordinary growth.
A dedicated team is Max Stock’s secret ingredient for keeping customers happy.
From little things, big things grow
Max Stocks’ regional influence is evident in the numbers – they stock 5,000 top quality fresh, frozen and dry products, and had a 54 percent growth between 2022 and 2023 alone. “We’ve moved away from looking at Max Stocks as a take-away supplier of fish to a dominant player in food service within the region,” says Sheree Cassaniti, Max Stocks General Manager. “We have loyal customers who have been with Max Stocks since Ken and Sally ran it back at the start, and then we have newer customers too, who are impressed with the fact Max Stocks is locally owned.”
Russell puts the business’ success down to its culture of unwavering integrity. “Integrity, honesty and fairness have always stuck with me from Dad,” he says. “I think part of our success is that we’re always trying to be fair, whether you’re dealing with a supplier, staff member or customer.”
There’s arguably never been a better time to be in food service. “The support for independent operators at the moment is greater than it’s ever been,” Russell says. “We can do things the bigger guys can’t do – we can pivot our business whenever we want. Big corporates may have to go through a chain of command to get a change within their business, whereas we can have ideas and make that change immediately.”
Local heroes
But beyond serving the local hospitality venues, hospitals and cruise ships with their daily food deliveries, Max Stocks have also become part of the emergency services ecosystem when Mother Nature throws a curveball.
Take Tropical Cyclone Jasper that hit last December, seeing 3.2m of rain recorded in the Port Douglas region in less than a week, leading to major floods and roads collapsing. While locals rallied to rebuild the town, Max Stocks were calling in favours from their extensive network to ensure locals got the supplies they needed to keep running. “The hospitals were screaming for supply,” Russell says. “Instead of sitting on our hands, we looked at other ways of getting stock to our customers, and ended up hiring a fishing trawler to do a trip via water, and hired a refrigerator vehicle from someone in Port Douglas to get the stock in good quality to where it needed to go.”
So effective was their strategy that the government asked them for help. “We made connections with disaster recovery teams in those locations and assisted them with transporting medication to the hospitals and nursing homes because they had no other way to get there,” Fisher recalls.
“There’s never a dull moment, but whether we’ve been dealing with the potato shortage, logistics companies going under, COVID pandemic challenges or crazy weather, looking after the customers that have stuck with us has always been our priority, rather than trying to get more dollars by selling at a higher price to new customers.”
When Mother Nature throws a curveball at North Queensland, Max Stocks are ready to pull out all stops to get food supply delivered to those who need it most.
Max Stocks Townsville premises, today.
Managing Director
18 Lorna Court, Townsville Queensland 4818