Her plant, which opened in July and can process 20,000 pounds of lobster meat daily, is one of only four in Maine. At least half of the state’s lobster catch is sent to Canada to be processed and labeled a product of that country, a procedure Ms. Bean considers “a tyranny on our price here.”

But many say her belief that all Maine lobster should be processed in Maine is naïve. Canadian processors can charge less because they are given generous government subsidies, said Patrice McCarron, executive director of the Maine Lobstermen’s Association.

Image Her lobster stand in Rockland, Me. She also owns a processing plant. Credit... Craig Dilger for The New York Times

Even more controversial is Ms. Bean’s resolve to have the state’s lobster fishery certified as environmentally sustainable by the Marine Stewardship Council, a London group that promotes responsible fishing. Wal-Mart, for one, has vowed that by 2011, it will buy only from fisheries certified by the council. “People are worried about where their fish is coming from,” she said. “We here in Maine know our catch is sustainable, but someone in California may not.”

Her position irks many lobstermen and dealers, who question why Maine should pay an estimated $150,000 for the certification and an additional $25,000 to $50,000 a year to maintain it. Maine lobster does not need an outside group’s approval, they say, and there is no guarantee that certification would make it more valuable anyway.

“This industry can’t bear any more cost right now if not guaranteed a profit,” Mr. Cushman said.

Others question Ms. Bean’s choice of Frank Perdue as a role model, saying that giant companies should not have a role in Maine’s famous mom-and-pop industry. “All the little independent operators, whether farmer or fisherman, seem to disappear in that process,” said a veteran lobsterman who requested anonymity because he said he did not want to anger Ms. Bean. “That doesn’t bode well for 100 little harbors up and down the coast of Maine.”

If Ms. Bean knows she has detractors, she does not say so. She said she worried at first that lobstermen would not want to sell to her, and that they suspected her interest in the industry was fleeting. “The impression I got was that they were thinking, ‘Oh, well, she’ll turn all this into condominiums,’ ” Ms. Bean said of her wharves, where the lobstermen sell her their catch.