Mustad History

The success story of Mustad started on a farm close to the town of Gjøvik, Norway, in 1832. Here lived the farmers Ole Hund and Hans Skikkelstad, and in this year they built the first mill by the Hunns River and called it "Brusveen spiger og ståltrådfabrikk" (Brusveen Nail and Steel Wire Mill). Ole Hund soon retired, but Hans Skikkelstad continued with his son-in-law, Sheriff Ole Mustad.

In the very beginning the production was geared towards the local market, producing horse-shoe nails and steel wire for local farmers. It didn't take long, though, for them to become one of the largest mills of this kind in Norway, and then reaching out to global markets.

The Company's official name was O. Mustad & Søn AS, which was first introduced after Mr. Skikkelstad died in 1843 and after Ole Mustad's son, Hans, joined the Company. By recruiting the best European mechanics, engineers and technicians available at the time, Hans Mustad was responsible for making Mustad into an international fish hook manufacturer to be reckoned with.

Today Mustad offers more than 15,000 different patterns of fish hooks and the customers can be found all over the world.

Mustad Autoline was launched in 1972 and was like a revolution for longline fishing. In 1983 came the Swiveled Rotoline and this reinforced the strong Mustad influence, challenging the old fishing techniques even further. Since then Mustad has supplied more than 700 Autoline, fishing lines, lines,s world wide. Today the Autoline fleet consists of about 250 vessels in daily operation.

After more than 170 years, Mustad is still expanding. It continues to be a resourceful company, able to operate successfully in an increasingly competitive global environment, always ready for new challenges both in terms of commercial fisheries and sport fishing.