Farm Pak Products Inc., Spring Hope, N.C., is celebrating its 50th anniversary this year.
The company, which markets sweet potatoes for Barnes Farming Corp., was strictly a conventional sweet potato seller when Carson Barnes established it in 1969, pioneering sales of the vegetable on the East Coast. Now the company sells watermelons and organic and value-added sweet potato products, including microwaveable wrapped sweet potatoes, according to a news release.
Different varieties, including Evangeline and Murasaki, are also in the Farm Pak lineup.
“As the company kept growing in size and became more and more successful, our packing facility demands increased until we couldn’t accommodate our orders,” Jose Calderon, sales manager, said in the release.
The company now has four packing lines to pack to customer specifications, and temperature-controlled space to hold palletized sweet potatoes to ensure quality, Calderon said.
Josh Barnes, storage and greenhouse manager, represents the third generation at Farm Pak.
Johnny Barnes, who became president in 2012, said the company ships to international markets, with the top markets in the United Kingdom and the European Union. The company plans to redesign its website — www.farmpak.com — and logo in the “near future,” according to the release.
