Behold the Bootstrapper: Sarah Frey’s Journey from 80 Acres to a Seven-State Operation

Sarah Frey started a simple produce delivery route that has evolved into a fresh fruit and vegetable operation that distributes products nationally.
Sarah Frey started a simple produce delivery route that has evolved into a fresh fruit and vegetable operation that distributes products nationally.
(Angela Talley Photography)

Fresh after a melon pickup in Indiana, Sarah Frey pulled her truck and trailer into the parking lot of a massive building site. The nearly complete warehouse would be a distribution center for Walmart in Olney, Ill. As a supplier to a few Walmart stores, Frey has been patiently watching the construction progress. She had an idea. 

“Wouldn’t it be great if I could just take a load of melons directly to that distribution center versus me going to 12 to 15 Walmart stores individually? I was a kid at the time, so I was thinking about how to save myself time and deliver produce to even more stores,” she recalls.

Frey wandered in and asked if the facility would have a produce buyer. An employee answered in the affirmative and pointed her to a lady setting up an office. 

“I introduced myself as one of their suppliers and asked if they would be accepting deliveries here,” Frey says. “She said, ‘Yes, and I’m so glad you stopped by. I’m going to need three to five semi loads of watermelons every week and two or three loads of cantaloupes. Can you just take care of that for us?’”

Frey responded: “Absolutely.”

“I walk out of the building, and a light goes off in my head — she said semis,” Frey says. “I don’t have a semi nor do I have a CDL.” 

At age 19, Frey had just landed herself a distribution deal with Walmart. She was on the verge of supersizing her homegrown produce route. This pivotal moment taught Frey a lesson that still guides her today. You reach success when luck and preparation meet. 


"I saw the beauty and the struggles of how we grew up. I had an epiphany and knew I had to stay. I had to stay behind to get ahead.” -Sarah Frey


Blind Ambition

Frey’s confidence and gumption to take business deals head-on came from a childhood of tough farm lessons and unwavering family support. The youngest of her parents’ combined 21 children, Frey grew up on a struggling farm — 80 acres of subpar soil in southern Illinois. They grew or hunted their food, while her parents financially scraped by with various off-farm jobs.

“It was never my dream to stay on the farm,” Frey says. “Everything I did in my early years was meant to move me off that farm.”

One bright spot each summer was tagging along for six weeks on her mother’s melon route, where they purchased produce from neighboring farms and delivered it to local grocery stores — earning much-needed money for the family. 

“I made my first sale when I was 8 years old,” Frey says. “I had to go into grocery stores and talk to the produce managers. I’d ask them how many they wanted of the  watermelons or cantaloupes or whatever we were selling out of the back of the pickup truck that day.”

Frey Farms
The Frey Farms team includes 70 full-time and 400 seasonal employees. Photo: Angela Talley Photography

12 stores to 150

At 15, Frey moved out of her family home and attended high school and college simultaneously. To provide for herself, she took over the produce delivery business.

“I grew the 12-store route to 150 grocery stores,” she says. “I loved my melon route; I loved seeing how different stores merchandised their products. I was fascinated by food.”

Once Frey turned 16, she wanted to expand. She asked her banker for a $10,000 loan to buy a delivery truck. He gave her two years to pay it off. She replied: “I only want three months. The melon route makes good money, and it will make more if I have this truck.” 

Sixty days later, she walked in the bank with a dusty envelope of $10,000 plus interest. Little did she know how crucial that good impression with her banker would be. 

Stay Behind; Get Ahead

While her future was looking bright, Frey’s parents’ financial situation was dire. The family farm was facing foreclosure. As the last kid at home, it fell on her young shoulders to liquidate the farm’s assets.

“I was walking the last horse off the farm,” she says. “It was the golden hour, and you could see for miles. I saw the beauty and the struggles of how we grew up. I had an epiphany and knew I had to stay. I had to stay behind to get ahead.”

Frey went to the bank and took out a loan, based on the cash flow of her produce route, to buy the farm. 

“Once I bought the farm, I had to figure out what to do with it,” Frey says. “The good news about a failing farm is it can’t get much worse. I’d learned what not to do.” 

Frey knew her clay and weed-prone 80 acres would not pencil as a row crop farm. She thought about her produce route, which gave her an idea. 

“Our dirt was very suitable for pumpkins, and pumpkins would give me a longer selling season,” she says. “Even though input costs are higher, you could sell those crops for a higher value.”

Frey leaned on the farmers she’d met on her produce route, local Extension professionals, grocery store managers and family. 

“Many of the farmers and store buyers had seen me coming in for a number of years with my mother,” she says. “They wanted me to succeed, and they cheered me on.”

Listen to Sarah Frey discuss her journey with Andrew McCrea on the Farming the Countryside podcast:

More With Less

Mostly, Frey has learned by doing.

“When we started the business, we needed harvest vehicles,” she says. “I was looking at tractors, trailers, all of which cost hundreds of thousands of dollars. I thought: How do we do more with less? We ended up finding these old school buses that were $2,500 apiece.”

With a cutting torch and welder, the Frey team converted the buses into a perfect harvest vehicle.

“We basically got a $50,000 piece of equipment for $2,500,” she says. “Now, almost 30 years later, we use hundreds of buses to harvest our crops all across the country.”

Instead of buying a fleet of machinery for produce harvest, Frey Farms converts school buses. This business strategy was born out of necessity but is still used today across the farm. Photos: Angela Talley Photography

For many years, Frey was a one-woman show. After she landed the Walmart distribution agreement, she needed help. One by one, her four older brothers returned to southern Illinois and joined her in the business. Early on they operated without taking salaries and put in grueling hours for the business.

They built a network of farmers across the country so they would never leave a contract unfilled or a customer unsatisfied. 

“I sent my brothers all over the country to get enough produce for our retail customers,” Frey says. “We would find produce and ask that farmer where other farmers were. We went farm to farm, until we had enough for our retail partners.”

As Frey Farms grew, they reinvested in the business and bought farmland in several states. They professionalized their operations and diversified their customer base. 

“Now, we farm in seven states and supply the top 25 retailers in the U.S. providing American-grown fruits and vegetables,” Frey says. 

Frey Farms watermelon
Frey Farms is one of the largest growers of pumpkins and watermelon in the U.S. Photo: Angela Talley Photography

“Sarah is intent on growing her business but manages that growth with her ability to supply a consistent quality product,” says Paul Fleming, a produce industry consultant who has known Frey for 20 years. “She ensured she was expanding acres to match demand and not be in a position of having to look for customers to cover excess acreage. This strategy has allowed her to maintain a strong market position.”

What has really helped Frey, he says, is her focus on people

“Her personality and the way that she conducts herself makes you like and respect her, and that attribute also makes buyers want to do business with her,” Fleming says. “It is a cliché, but she makes you feel like you are the only one in the room.”

Sarah Frey quote

Full-Circle Focus

Frey Farms is one of the largest growers of pumpkins and watermelon in the U.S. Beyond its scope, Frey is most proud she reached her ultimate goal: From a little patch of earth in southern Illinois, she created a business and life for her family, which includes her sons, William and Luke. Every season of struggle and victory was worth it. 

“The growing seasons that are fallow can teach as much as the ones that are bountiful,” Frey says.  


Sarah Frey’s Top Negotiation Strategies

While in her mid-20s and on bed rest with her second son, Sarah Frey received a call from Harvard professor James Sebenius. He wanted to interview her for a case study on her negotiations with Walmart. “It was about how a small company like ours could negotiate with a global company and beat out the competition,” Frey says. “It compared me to David, of David and Goliath. I’ve always respected David because he didn’t play the giant’s game; he played his own. That may be the secret of both business and life: Playing your game, not theirs.”

Here are some of Frey’s keys to negotiation success, as highlighted in the 2006 Harvard Business School case study:

  • Understand and study the culture of the business with which you are negotiating. 
  • Think of negotiations as partnerships. Focus on a common goal and ask questions. 
  • Focus on customer diversification. With Walmart, Frey did not want to let it occupy more than 20% of her business. “It’s hard to negotiate with a company that controls yours,” she says.
  • Use an agenda for all meetings.

Snapshot of Frey Farms

Founded in 1992 and headquartered in Keenes, Ill., Frey Farms is led by Sarah Frey and her four brothers: Leonard, John, Harley and Ted. It includes:

  • Growing, packing and shipping: watermelon, cantaloupes, pumpkins, squash, sweet corn, peanuts and fall ornamentals.
  • 12,000 to 15,000 acres of production in seven states.
  • 70 full-time and 400 seasonal employees  (Frey Farms is the largest H-2A visa employer in Illinois).
  • Watermelon juice and agua frescas, under the Sarah’s Homegrown and Tsamma brands.
  • Supplier to the nation’s largest retailers, including Walmart, Aldi, Lowe’s, Whole Foods and Kroger.

Frey Farms Products


In 2020, Sarah Frey published a memoir about her rural childhood and how it lead her to to take risks that paid off in unexpected ways. Learn more about "The Growing Season."

The Growing Season

Watch Sarah Frey's presentation at the 2022 Top Producer Summit: How to See Past Life's Imperfections and Find the Good Even in Dark Times
 

 

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