Family grows farm-fresh loyalty

Sixteen years ago, the Yancy family decided to sell some of the produce from their garden.

Now, they have 7 acres and are thinking they might add more.

"I started out with a 6-foot table," Greg Yancy said. Even without advertising, he sold $1,200 in produce that year.

Since then, the small business has grown to include customers in seven counties, including some wholesalers, he said.

One customer has driven from Magalia to buy fresh food from Yancy's Produce for 15 years, Yancy said.

Charlie Miller, who makes regular trips from Corning to the farm southwest of Orland, said the reason he returns week after week, and year after year is trust.

"Nobody hides any secrets here. If they say (the fruits and vegetables) are organic, I know they're organic," Miller said.

Consistent quality is another reason Miller drives so far.

"I don't know of a vegetable stand that sells anything better than here," he said. Besides, he gets to joke around and have a good time while he's there.

Yancy told a story about a couple who moved to Sacramento and still made weekly trips to the farm.

"They had to come to Yancy's," he said. "Customers want to come to the farm where (the produce) is grown."

"Some customers are just like family," he noted.

And it seems they feel the same way about the Yancys.

When a late-spring frost destroyed nearly the entire garden in 2008, Yancy said customers offered to help replant and do whatever they could to keep things going.

Having a strong relationship with Eisley Nursery made a big difference, too. They sold the Yancys large plants for the cost of smaller ones, Yancy said, noting that once the new plants were received, the garden was fully planted in two days.

That left them only three weeks off their production schedule, he said. The family, did the work themselves.

"But we really appreciated the (customers') offers," Yancy said.

"This community is unbelievable. We make a profit, but this business is for the community," Yancy said.

When the family patriarch, Melvin Yancy, had a stroke a few years ago, "customers offered to pick" and sell produce while his wife, Lenora Yancy, was at the hospital, she said.

But their son, Greg, took time off from his full-time job to take care of things himself.

His passion for the business and its customers is clear. He clearly cares about growing and selling the best produce possible. He even hand washes and wipes down everything before it goes on the stand.

"I'm kind of picky about our stuff," he said.

"Our customers are faithful," Yancy said. "I guarantee as much as I can."

For example, if someone purchases a watermelon that is not fully ripe, Yancy's Produce will replace it.

A family affair

Except fruit trees, Greg Yancy grows most plants from seed, he said.

He does not do it all himself, however.

The whole family gets in on the act. Yancy said everyone helps plant the garden and harvest the wide variety of produce.

While the rest of the family — including small children and wives — are planting and picking, Lenora Yancy does the packing.

She said keeping things going means "work, work, work, but it's rewarding work."

Of her sons, Greg is the farmer. His brothers, Christopher and Steve, are more mechanically inclined. But everyone works hard to make the business successful.

"Business is growing rapidly," Greg Yancy said.

Some deals are in the works, one with a company that wants to buy large quantities from the family business.

On their 7 acres, the Yancys grow tomatoes, five kinds of summer squash, five kinds of winter squash, four varieties of cucumbers, egg plant, okra, cantaloupe, honey dew and watermelon, nectarines, cherries and peaches, as well as a variety of table grapes, with Thompson being the biggest crop.

New this year are zinfandel grapes, and Greg Yancy said next year, they'll add chardonnay grapes — both for eating.

He said a customer told him she grew up eating zinfandel grapes as a child in Italy, so he decided to give them a try.

Also coming next year will be 10,000 onion plants and an expansion of orchard fruits. Yancy said apricots, plums, pears and pluats — a cross between apricots and plums that taste almost like a strawberry — will be part of the spring plant.

He expects to have full harvest in three to four years, he said.

Noting his family lineage, Yancy said his father's family came to the United States in 1649 and the original plantation mansion they built in Virginia is still standing.

Lenora Yancy's family — named Ellis — arrived in 1659.

"They were all farmers," Greg Yancy said.

Contact Lydia Harris at 934-6800, 865-3110 or lharris@tcnpress.com.