VENICE — Ambo Health, a company that makes Omega Cure and Wellpride fish oil supplements, is starting construction this week on a new 7,200-square-foot plant in Venice.

It is the company's third expansion in two years and driven by strong demand for the company's two Omega-3 fish oil products.

The company was founded by Dr. Anne Marie Chalmers and Dr. Bo Martinsen in December 2003, selling Wellpride, a fish oil supplement for horses, out of an 800-square-foot building in Nokomis.

Two years later the duo began marketing Omega Cure, a fish oil supplement for humans.

That product has resulted in the company's growth, with sales more that quadrupling, the company said. Ambo executives said sales have risen for nine consecutive quarters.

The company hopes to sustain its growth with the launch of a new product: a blister delivery system so people do not miss a dose even while they are traveling.

The company's two founders said they hope Ambo's expansion marks the "beginning of the transformation of Sarasota and Venice into a fish oil hot bed."

"The fish oil business is booming," Chalmers said in a statement. "We have every intention of transforming Sarasota and Venice into the fish oil capital of the United States."

Proponents of Omega-3 fish oil maintain that benefits can include improved heart, brain, and joint health, as well as weight regulation.

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