FREEPORT – Jeanette and Derek Lovitch have realized success where many have failed. For 10 years now, they have operated a businesses that caters to people interested in the well being of wild birds.

To observe that success, Freeport Wild Bird Supply, located at Freeport Plaza on U.S. Route 1, will celebrate its 10th anniversary with a morning bird walk and afternoon presentations on Aug. 23-24. The morning exercise will be one in a long list of bird walks that Derek Lovitch has led in and around Freeport. The Lovitches have sponsored bird-watching events such as the Bradbury Mountain Hawkwatch and Feathers Over Freeport, and his blog on the company website, www. freeportwildbirdsupply.com, keeps birders informed.

“We’re very visible in the birding community,” he said. “We do free bird walks every Saturday from the store. We carpool to local parks all year long.”

Freeport Wild Bird Supply has been in Freeport since April 1, 2009. But the Pownal couple also ran a wild bird supply store on Route 1 in Yarmouth when a huge fire burned it and several other stores on New Year’s Day of that year. They opened the Yarmouth operation in August 2004, giving them the 10 years in the bird business.

Outside Freeport Wild Bird Supply, birds flutter around the bird houses and feeders the Lovitches have set up near a stretch of lowland.

Community events provide a means for the Lovitches to connect with the public, but still, they must have a product the public wants to buy. The ease of birding helps in that regard, Jeanette Lovitch said.

“It’s a connection to the outdoors,” she said. “Backyard bird feeding, which is mostly what we cater to, is not an expensive hobby, and it’s a connection to your back yard. You can do it from an apartment in Portland.”

Derek Lovitch says the store also benefits from an increase in interest in birding everywhere.

“I don’t think you’d call this a niche business anymore,” he said. “It’s a $20 billion industry.”

Both field biologists, Jeanette and Derek Lovitch met in the Upper Peninsula of Michigan, where she was executive director of Whitefish Point Bird Observatory in Paradise, Mich. She hired him as a field orinthologist

Jeanette Lovitch, 42, had been exposed to Maine from her days as a student at Colby College. Derek Lovitch, 37, had attended Rutgers University, in his native New Jersey.

The couple had decided to give Maine a try, and moved to Portland in 2003, where they were doing “odd jobs.”

“A couple of months later,” he said, “we decided we didn’t want to leave. We tried to figure out a way to stay. It wasn’t a ‘light-bulb moment’ to open a store. It was two sticks slowly rubbing together. We wanted to be our own bosses, and figured out a wild bird specialty store was the way to go. There were none at the time in southern Maine, because some had closed. There was one in Camden.”

The Lovitches were part of a franchise when they began their business in Yarmouth, but eventually began their own operation. Then came the big fire.

“It was in the depths of the recession, and 29 businesses were destroyed in that fire,” he said. “Ironically, we had looked at this space (in Freeport) before the fire.”

They agree that Freeport Plaza is a better location. There are more tourists, the plaza has easier access and is more visible, they say.

Derek Lovitch also operates a guiding business, and has written a birding book, “How To Be A Better Birder,” published in 2012. He recently returned from a gig as a guide on a schooner that left Camden on a birding tour. On the tour, he led people to watches on islands and breeding areas.

Jeanette Lovitch says that Freeport Wild Bird Supply sells a lot of feed, feeders and the hardware to set them up, and mechanisms that keep squirrels out of the feeders. They “do the research” it takes to offer top-of-the-line products, she said.

They’re faring well.

“We continue to grow,” Derek Lovitch said. “Every year has been better since we re-opened. We work hard to make sure people know who we are. We rely a lot on word of mouth.”

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A CLOSER LOOK

Freeport Wild Bird Supply, located at Freeport Plaza on U.S. Route 1, celebrates 10 years in business with free public events on the weekend of Aug. 23-24, from 10 a.m.-6 p.m. Saturday’s lineup begins with a birdwalk at 8 a.m., at the store, where people will meet and car pool. In the afternoon, Chewonki of Wiscasset will present “The Bugmobile” at 1:45 p.m. and “Owls of Maine” at 3:30. People will get a chance to see insects and owls up close. There will be door prizes and gifts, free Birds and Beans coffee and other treats.

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Derek and Jeanette Lovitch have connected to the community with many birding events, and are making a go of it at Freeport Wild Bird Supply in Freeport Plaza.