Crawfish prices said to be on an incline

WESTLAKE/SULPHUR, LA (KPLC) - Sandra McCormick has owned Crawfish 2 Go in Westlake for the past 15 years, going into her 16th season, she says she has seen the market for crawfish grow.

“Crawfish used to be a Louisiana thing,” McCormick said. “People in Louisiana eat a lot of crawfish. Well Texas people have discovered them and they like them. So a lot of crawfish are going out to Texas.”

McCormick says every year she has been in business, the price has steadily been increasing. Her husband, Pete McCormick, says that upward trend in prices is here to stay.

“We used to have day where we could buy them for way less than a dollar,” McCormick said. “Those days are just gone.”

Crystal Tyler is the manager at Lebleu's Landing in Sulphur, who already got a jump start on selling crawfish this year. She says she sees the growing market happening in Texas too.

“They’re able to sell them cheaper over there, because they come over here and pay this price, bring them back there and sell them a little cheaper,” Tyler said. “Well then people don’t want to come over here to pay for them.”

McCormick says the growth in popularity outside of Louisiana helps the crawfish industry as a whole but hurts small businesses at the same time. He says the farmers prioritize the businesses ordering the most, which he says a lot of which are coming from Texas.

“It’s just me and my wife, we have to pay the same price and people buying them in Houston or whatever on a whole sale price,” McCormick said.

“In the next five years, the price is probably going up more,” Tyler said. “Especially if it continues to be in such a high demand.”

McCormick says they will just have to adapt to the changes.

“Since I’ve been doing this, crawfish places have come and gone,” McCormick said. “I’m just very proud to be in the business and I can’t help the market in Texas, we just have to be the best we can be.”

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