Tag Archives: Vidalia Onions

Glenville Hosts Sweet Onion Festival

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Glennville, GA

There was no shortage of food, fun and floats in the small city of Glennville, as they recently celebrated another successful harvest with their 47th annual Sweet Onion Festival. And the thousands in attendance were treated to not just all the festivities, but also a chance to catch up with old friends and family on this special weekend.

“Well, they’re going to get an opportunity to socialize, get some Vidalia onions or some Glennville onions, whatever you want to call them and just socialize with their neighbors and friends here,” says Wayne Dasher, Chairman of the Glennville Sweet Onion Festival. “Every, community, every family needs a family reunion, so to speak. So, here, it’s Mother’s Day weekend. What a better day could you have to bring all the folks in to visit their families and their mothers and show honor to them and come to the Glennville Onion Festival and get some treats for them or some gifts.”

Even though Glennville might not have their name on the bags at the grocery store, it is actually the birthplace of Georgia’s official state vegetable.

“The original onion originated in Glennville. There was a man from New York that brought the onions down and married a local woman here and started growing them here fifty years ago,” says Dasher. “Piggly Wiggly Southern was in Vidalia and they were the ones that bought the onions. And on their bags, they furnished the bags, and they had on there the sweet onions, the pride of Piggly Wiggly Vidalia, Georgia. So, that’s where it picked up the name from.”

While this event is designed to recognize all the hard work that goes into producing this world-famous product, it’s also shining a spotlight on just how much impact the entire agricultural industry has on this community.

“There’s a lot of economic growth out of it. You know, the workers that are here, the people that these larger farms – Bland Farms, G & R Farms, two of the largest growers here in the county, each one of them probably employs two hundred people each. You know, we’ve got other industries here. We’ve got the Rotary Corporation. They’re the largest manufacturer of lawn mower blades in the world. They have about three hundred employees total all over. It’s just an opportune time to come and share this fruit with our neighbors,” says Dasher.

By: Damon Jones

Vidalia Onion Grower Overcomes Difficult Growing Season

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Glennville, GA

While they might raise chicken and cattle, as well as grow watermelons and other row crops during the summer, B & H Farms is best known for their three hundred acres of Vidalia onions. Despite not growing up on a farm, it’s an industry co-owner, Ben Hilliard developed a passion for at an early age.

“My dad was a forester and my mom worked for the board of education and we actually lived in town until my senior year in high school, which, I’ve always had an interest in farming. I worked for a small tobacco farm growing up and then later became partners with that farmer’s son,” says Hilliard.

Recently, he, along with his business partner, Chase Brennan, were named the 2022 Grower of the Year by the Vidalia Onion Committee, thanks in large part to their commitment to new practices and technology.

We’re extremely fortunate and blessed to be able to even be in the area to grow a Vidalia onion. Not everyone in the state gets to enjoy the process of growing these Vidalia’s. We have what we call AgSense on our pivots, which you can operate from a cell phone, which is extremely convenient. You can watch during the middle of the night, or it tells you if you have an error or problem, and with the labor issues, if you can just maximize your efficiency with your work through technology it will equate to a lot of time with your family,” says Hilliard.

However, that technology isn’t much help during harvest as Vidalia onions are considered one of the most labor-intensive crops, which results in some pretty long hours over the next few weeks.

“It’s a pretty hectic time, but it’s pretty gratifying when you get finished,” says Hilliard. “There’s a lot of pressure, a lot of long hours, but when you’re finished, it makes it all worth it. There’s a huge amount of work. Everything is hand clipped. We haul them in by trucks and tractor trailers and then obviously, we go through our drying and packing process before it ever goes onto another truck and heads to the retailer for the customers.”

However, you won’t find any complaining, as this year’s crop appears to be in good shape despite some less-than-ideal weather during growing season.

“We’ve had some pretty volatile weather conditions. That early freeze around Christmas hurt us really bad from a population standpoint per acre, but all that considered, we’re very blessed to even have what we have to pack and harvest this year,” says Hilliard.

That gratitude extends to the consumers, who are the main reason Hilliard puts in all the time and effort to grow Georgia’s signature vegetable.

“The most gratifying part is to take a seed and get it to harvest and get it to a customer and then have positive feedback from that customer; hearing how much they enjoyed it and how much, they enjoyed grilling or fed their families,” says Hilliard.

By: Damon Jones

Vidalia Onion Harvest Underway

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Lyons, GA – While Vidalia onions went into the ground just 5 months ago, it’s probably seemed like an eternity to producers as the growing season saw its fair share of obstacles. And that’s after Hurricane Irma rolled through South Georgia while they were getting their seed beds ready.

“After that, we did okay as far as getting everything planted,” says UGA Area Onion Agent, Cliff Riner. “But, then the first week of January, where we had about 5 inches of snow here and the snow didn’t really hurt us as much as that whole week it was 40 degrees as a high. So, the majority of the time, that full week, we were in the 20s at night and the 40s during the day.”

Despite all the challenges, there will still be plenty of delicious sweet onions on the shelves.

“We’ve actually had snow,” says Delbert Bland, President of Bland Farms. “We’ve had cold weather. We’ve had everything that you could imagine this year. But believe it or not, these onions are pretty tough. They made it through it all and we are pretty excited about this crop. We’ve been shipping out about a week and they look excellent. And we shouldn’t have any problem. We’ve already done over 200 loads, so we’re letting them roll.”

That’s just the beginning of a busy harvesting season that will see more than 2 million boxes of onions ship out of the Bland Farms processing facility. While the growing conditions did have some effect on this year’s quantity, the quality will remain the same.

“The yields have been a little off in terms of total weight per acre,” says Riner. “However, the quality has been pretty good. We have had some quality issues on the first side on some onions, but others have made up for that. We see a tighter onion, it’s firmer, it might be a little smaller but he flavor is there.”

This year, you should be on the lookout for bags of the smaller onions called Lil’ O’s, which have the same big flavor in a smaller package.

“See, when you do onions in the field, you’ll have anywhere from a 4″ onion down to a 1″ onion. So, you get all different sizes all the time. The smaller onion, that we have not marketed in the past, it’s the smaller onions that taste just as sweet and is just as good a quality but there’s not as much size on them. But they’re perfect for putting in stews and different areas that you can use them in,” says Bland.

So far, there has been a large demand for this product, which means consumers can expect to see them in their stores soon.

“What we would do with them is put then in a bag and just sell them bulk as peewees and stuff like that,” says Bland. “But there really wasn’t a market for them. They were real cheap. But marketing is all about how someone perceives the product and you got to make them want it. And that’s what we’re doing here.”

So, no matter the size of the onion, consumers can expect the same great taste year after year thanks to the time, effort, and money these producers put into growing this crop.

“You know, they’ve invested a lot in the research center as well as some of the other trials we do with the University of Georgia and that’s really paid off,” says Riner. “More and more producers are producing a sweeter and sweeter onion.”

By: Damon Jones