LANSING, MI – Michigan Attorney General Dana Nessel on Thursday filed an antitrust lawsuit against the Hoffmann Family of Companies and Hoffman Marine, which operates the Mackinac Island ferry services and parking on both sides of the bridge. The AG is citing a violation of the Michigan Antitrust Reform Act.
According to a press release, historically, ferry service to the island was provided by three independent competing companies: Shepler’s, Starline and the Arnold Transit Company, but in the past 10 years, Starline bought Arnold Transit and Hoffmann bought Starline and Shepler’s.
In addition to owning all passenger ferries to the Island, Hoffman has also taken control of all the Mackinac Island docks where a competing ferry could operate.
In a press conference yesterday, Nessel said: “They’ve raised prices, limited services and leveraged their massive power in alarming ways, even threatening to suspend ferry service to Mackinac Island entirely if local government didn’t give them favorable extended agreements to let them keep hiking their prices.”
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