
"OUR STORY" we were Louisiana residents from the city of Thibodaux. We had recently purchased some land and was putting house plans in place to build our family home we once dreamed of. I was a River boat captain and my wife was a stay at home mother for our 4 children. One hitch out on a towboat I was thinking how nice it would be to live in the country for once and slow down on the hustle bustle of city life. I came home from that hitch and immediately told my wife I was heading to MS to just look at other options. Truthfully my wife did not come with me bc she was not ready to make the decision of moving to the country. I got in my vehicle and headed to MS on I55. I made plans with a real estate company to look at a few homes. Not knowing the area or what to expect I ended up in Tylertown & Jayess area looking at homes. I knew my wife would not be willing to live that far in the country. With the help of Tara Campbell I found a home in Deerfield Subdivision in Summit, MS that I knew my family would be accepting of. So I called them to schedule an appointment to view the property. I headed south on I55 back to Louisiana while waiting for our scheduled date & time of showing. I showed my wife pictures and information of the listing. She then agreed to give it a chance of living in MS. We arrived at the showing of the property and knew we would love to raise our family in this beautiful home. We agreed to make the sellers an offer while at the viewing. Tara Campbell then reached out to the sellers and presented them our offer, which was accepted immediately. Must I add the sweet lady whom owned the property made us homemade cookies and wrote us a letter explaining her home and how she would love us to have the same memories she once had. 30 days later we had our home in Thibodaux, LA SOLD & home in Summit, MS purchased. We loaded the moving trucks and headed to our new home in Summit, MS. After 3 years of living in Summit, MS we were missing our Louisiana Cajun Cooking !!! My wife felt our kids were older and she was ready to find her a lil part-time job of some sort. We happen to be riding in McComb, MS and stumbled across what we would have never thought would end up being the start of DA CAJUN SHACK. We made an offer to purchase and our offer was accepted. What once was the well known hotspot for Italian Ice we got in there and said let's bring our Cajun Heritage to McComb, MS. We started putting our menu together offering true New Orleans Overstuffed Po'boys, Etouffee, Gumbo, Seafood, & much more... we opened for business in October of 2018 not knowing if or how well cajun food would do in our new hometown. We had a customer that had visited several times withing a few months and oneday he left his number and asked one of our employees if the owner could give him a call. Keep in mind my wife, kids & family with the exception of a few employees were running our small business while I was working off as a boat captain to keep our $ flowing. My wife called me one-day and said babe the guy came and left his number again and would like you to give him a call. So I then called the number not knowing what I was about to face. It was a guy by the name of Donald which happen to be the owner of ROUSES SUPERMARKET. I introduced myself to him and he introduced his self to me and started discussing my business. He was impressed with our business model even though it was on a very small scale. He inquired about our capability of providing live crawfish to there stores. I immediately replied with we not capable of doing so, we can give you our suppliers name and number. His response was we have a team in our seafood department that will help guide you. After an invite to ROUSES corporate office for an official meeting we met there team. After meeting there team both my wife and I thought why us ? Why would they want to give us an opportunity like this? After much thought we came to the conclusion we were not financially structured to take on a customer of this size. I prayed silently by myself asking for guidance and a path for our future. Both my wife & I said lets run with it, we will give it our all and try our best. We then opened DA CAJUN SHACK- WHOLESALE CO. Less than a year later we were faced with the unknown Covid-19 challenges. Although many businesses were dealing with many challenges our business was booming. Shortly after we started experiencing staffing challenges that later caused us to close the doors of our small Cajun Food establishment in McComb. We focused and continued our wholesale business with ROUSES. We had such a great experience & following me and my wife was trying to think of ways to continue our Cajun Heritage within our community. That's when we stumbled across a building located on the corner of HWY 51 in the Lake Dixie Springs area. After some thought and vision I came up with the idea of a Fresh Seafood Market. But I wanted more than just fresh seafood, I wanted cajun seasonings, quality cookware products, cajun meats, etc... I put my vision into reality and came up with a business plan. I had a vision and went to work. We purchased the building and immediately started renovations. Not knowing where things would go we invested our earnings from our wholesale business to open DA CAJUN SHACK - SEAFOOD MARKET & STORE. Now that a lot of restaurants closed at this time more & more people were changing direction and starting to cook at home more. We feel we timed it just right, we transitioned from a restaurant business to a storefront. Perfect timing was in our favor. As 2 years went by restaurants were starting to come back and people were starting to eat out more. Our store front was booming, our wholesale business was booming so we decided it was time to offer Boiled Seafood again. This is when we broke ground on our drive-thru Boil N Geaux. Six months later we were ready to open. With a short break in between our busy season of crawfish me and my wife took a cruise to relax and enjoy each other and the hard work we have put in. While on the cruise I was approached by a large firework wholesale & retail company via email that they was interested in purchasing our store. We wasn't for sale and at this point really was not interested in selling. We were finally feeling complete. We had our wholesale business, our seafood market & store front, & our boiled n geaux. What more could we ask for. After getting back from the cruise we met with Robbie the owner of Robbie's Fireworks and agreed to sell our store. Both me and my wife said we was just going to take a deep breath and only work our wholesale business. Well I've always dreamed of owning my own sit down restaurant. I contacted The owners of Rockin Willys and made an offer to purchase the establishment that has been closed for the past 4.5 years. Long story short we went to work and began renovations. Now we are at the final stages before opening DA Cajun Shack - Cajun Buffet & Oyster Bar. To say we are BLESSED is an understatement. FYI it all started here in McComb, MS in our lil "CAJUN SHACK BUILDING" & look where we are now !!! Moral of our story is STAY FOCUSED, YOU NEVER KNOW WHERE YOU COULD END UP!!! We are an example that a business can be built in the small town of McComb, MS. Thank you to all who have helped make this journey a success
We look forward to seeing everyone for our GRAND OPENING JANUARY 6,2023