Young North Carolina Farmers Harness Skills to Grow New Agribusinesses

In partnership with: North Carolina Department of Agriculture & Consumer Services

Meet two young farmers utilizing technology, new marketing strategies and scientific data – plus unbridled enthusiasm – to grow delicious, healthy foods for their customers.

See more: North Carolina’s Young Farmers Keep Family Farms Successful

Teacher Turned Farmer

What started as a school project to grow vegetables has evolved into Daddy-Daughter Farm, a Lexington-based business that teacher Megan Lambeth Darnell hopes will turn into ownership of her own farm.

While in high school, Darnell planted and tended produce on a 90-by-70-foot field that’s been in her family for five generations. “It was just something I fell in love with,” she says. Going on to North Carolina State University to become a high school math teacher, Darnell continued to grow produce to sell at the Asheboro Farmers Market and at a stand on her family’s property.

While at N.C. State, Megan took a greenhouse management class that proved pivotal.

Darnell and her parents/business partners, Darrell and Sheryl Lambeth, were at a crossroads. “It was too much labor, trying to keep the weeds down while growing as much produce as people wanted in that original little field,” she recalls. They had to make the choice to either stop or go all in. Utilizing Darnell’s newly acquired knowledge, the family built a greenhouse and began growing their own plants from seed. They also introduced plasticulture and expanded to a larger field. “We are able to grow a lot more efficiently, so we can produce more,” Darnell says. To manage that increased production, she built a larger walk-in roadside stand.

Darnell says she’s constantly researching more efficient or less expensive ways of doing things.

“I think that might also be my teacher brain,” she says, laughing.

Looking ahead, Darnell and her husband, Zack, hope to have their own farm by the time she retires from teaching. “It’s amazing to watch a seed that looks like nothing go into the ground and watch it come to life,” she says. “It also gives me a sense of fulfillment when people say our produce is so good it just made their meal.”

Produce Boy Turned Agribusinessman

Many 15-year-olds lifeguard or flip burgers as summer jobs. Collin Blalock started a business instead.

Using his grandfather’s push planter, Blalock grew peas in a former cow pasture on his parents’ farm in Wilson. Increasing his acreage and offerings every year, Collin’s Produce took off. By his senior year of high school, Blalock realized farming would be his life’s work. While attending N.C. State, new friends at school found out about his business and began calling him “Produce Boy.”

College proved to be a challenge at times, Blalock recalls. “Farming is very time-consuming,” he says.

“The relationships we’ve formed with customers motivate me to keep going.”

– Collin Blalock, farmer, Collin’s Produce

“Not only do you have the fieldwork, but like all business owners, there’s the book work – marketing, phone calls. I found myself doing produce work before I did my schoolwork.” Despite the effort it took to manage his business and complete his degree, Blalock recognizes that his N.C. State major in agriculture science has been crucial to his success. Faculty mentors encouraged him to earn a master’s degree, which he completed in 2021. Blalock also learned to differentiate himself from other farmers by adding cut flowers to his produce offerings of sweet corn, watermelon, cabbage, collards, butter beans and peas.

See more: Collin’s Produce Delivers a Fresh, Fun and Fragrant Experience

Today, the former “Produce Boy” farms over 40 acres of produce and cut flowers, which he sells to restaurants, grocery stores, farmers markets and distribution centers. “This year, I want to expand as much as possible, especially bringing more people to the farm,” says Blalock, who ventured into agritourism last year with a sunflower maze, taking his father’s advice to diversify to spread out his risk.

“I love this life,” Blalock says of farming. “The relationships we’ve formed with customers motivate me to keep going. I love coming up with ideas and seeing them come to life.”