BUSINESS FISHING FOR NEW OWNERS.

Byline: Winston Ross The Register-Guard

NORTH BEND - For sale: fresh, fat, Silverpoint oysters.

A whole heck of a lot of oysters. And not just oysters, but oyster beds. Seven hundred and twenty acres of oyster beds. And oyster seeds. And an oyster barge. And a warehouse, and a processing room, and a retail counter, even a set of tanks in which to grow your own oyster seed.

One of the largest oyster businesses in Oregon is up for sale, and prior experience isn't a prerequisite, according to the current owners.

Lilli Clausen didn't know a thing about growing oysters when she quit her job as a substitute teacher to join her husband, Max, in starting Clausen Oysters 26 years ago. But she learned, she said. For the past five years, she's run the business by herself while Max kicks back at home, enjoying retirement.

Now it's Lilli's turn to lay down her shucker and turn her focus to gardening.

"I'd like to take a vacation," Clausen said.

Clausen can hardly believe she's an oyster farmer, even after all these years. The degree she earned after emigrating from Germany after World War II was in health education, not aquaculture.

"I should have an MBA," Clausen says. "Then I'd know what I was doing."

But Max was working 18-hour days for another area farmer and he needed help to go out on his own. The couple started with a little boat and 100 bags of seed.

The couple tried to distinguish themselves from competitors by selling individual oysters, rather than the entire cluster. As word of mouth spread, the business grew steadily each year - until a Panamanian wood chip freighter called the New Carissa ran aground in 1999, spilling 70,000 gallons of diesel and fuel oil onto the beach and into the north bay - the Clausens' prime harvesting grounds.

Before the spill, Clausen Oysters was grossing more than $1 million annually. After it, sales dropped to $300,000, simply because harvesting grounds were shot.

As they waited for a $1.4 million damage award, the Clausens borrowed money until they couldn't borrow any more. By 2003, with nothing yet in hand from the ship's owners, the Clausens' credit ran out and they stopped planting oysters. That fall, however, they finally got paid, so they only missed a single growing season.

"Carissa nearly killed us off," Lilli Clausen said.

Slowly, they rebuilt the business. Now the company can grow its own seed in six giant tanks on the the company's 6 acre grounds, sidestepping the need to buy it from a manufacturer.

The tanks are capable of growing 45,000 bags of seed per year, Clausen said. Five thousand bags of seed grows $1 million worth of oysters. Do the math, and the business could soon be netting $9 million annually, the Clausens said.

"Demand is way up," Clausen said. "And Coos Bay grows oysters very fast - in three years, vs. five in Washington state. They grow on top of each other. There are no predators, no stingrays. It's really a unique place."

Not that there aren't challenges in oyster growing. Harvest must always take place at low tide, be that at 2 a.m. or 2 p.m. It's tough to find people willing to work in the mud at all hours of the day, Clausen said. Plus, an inch and a half of rainfall in any 24-hour period closes down the farm, as state regulators don't want runoff from inland pollution sources to contaminate the product and make customers sick.

Still, the business is successful and "turnkey ready," Clausen said.

CLAUSEN OYSTERS After 26 years in business, Clausen Oysters is for sale. Asking price: Estimated at $9 million to $12 million Number of employees: 16 to 24, depending on the season What's included: A barge, several small boats, oyster equipment, 6.65 acres of property, storage warehouse, retail and processing plant, seeding tanks and 720 acres of oyster beds leased from Coos County and the Oregon International Port of Coos Bay Annual sales: $1.2 million