Harvest Fresh's Floyd honored

OTHELLO — Allan Floyd, owner of Harvest Fresh in Othello, was given the Potato Man For All Seasons award at the National Potato Council’s annual meeting in Orlando, Fla.

The council and “The Grower and The Packer” publications honors a person who has participated on many levels of the potato industry over a life-time.

Floyd was four years old when he had his first encounter with the potato industry in 1939, well before the modern harvest practices of today.

“The first thing I did in potatoes was shake the potatoes off the vines so my dad could pick them,” Floyd said.

The Floyds lived in the Ellensburg Valley, and a lot of families participated in the potato harvest. You were paid by the sack, and the way to make money was to pick as many potatoes as you could, as fast as you could. Pickers with vine shakers did better than those without.

“We didn’t do any of the picking, my brother Charles and I. We just shook the vines,” Floyd said.

A tractor with a digging machine pulled the potatoes out of the ground and placed them on top of the soil, and the vines fell over the top of the potatoes. Usually small children were assigned the task of removing them so parents or older children could pick with ease. In some cases the potatoes were still attached to the vines, and the children had to shake them, causing dust to fly in all directions.

“We really got dirty in those days,” Floyd said.

Floyd is 74 and now planning to semi-retire. He worked his way up from those beginnings.

He did a few other non-potato things during his 20s but most of his life has involved potatoes.

The final stage was part ownership of Harvest Fresh, a fresh potato packing plant in Othello, and part ownership of HF Farms, a potato grower.

Harvest Fresh packs and ships roughly 45,000 tons of fresh Russet Burbanks, Norgolds and Norkotahs a year under the Harvest Fresh and Green Giant labels and several private labels. Most of the potatoes come from 1,000 acres farmed by HF Farms, of which Floyd is part owner. The rest come from 500 acres farmed by other producers.

“What I think about most is running the packing house and all of the people who have passed through my life — my friendships in the potato industry, including the people who work for me at the plant. They are all great people,” Floyd said.

As for the award, it was a surprise. Floyd was suspicious something was afoot in Orlando, but he did not expect to receive the most significant award of the National Potato Council.

“There are thousands and thousands of people in the industry. To even be nominated is unbelievable to me,” he said.

The award was no surprise to Washington Potato Commission Executive Director Chris Voigt.

“(Floyd) has been a major player, a leader in the potato industry in the Northwest and the country,” he said.

Floyd was elected to the Washington Potato Commission for 12 years, serving as chairman in 2004-2005. He was a member of the Washington State Potato Foundation board for four years. He was on the Washington State Potato Committee for 30 years, and served six years on the U.S. Potato board.

Floyd helped initiate the Washington-Oregon United Potato Growers Co-op and served as its chairman for three years. He has been on the board of the United Potato Growers of America for four years, becoming its chairman in January 2008.

“Like a shepherd (he) has looked after the whole industry,” said Washington Potato Commission Chairman Ted Tschirky while endorsing Floyd’s nomination. “The Washington Potato Commission and the U.S. potato industry are better for his service.”

When Floyd was about 11 years old, his family lived in the Prosser area. His father became a producer, raising potatoes on 20 acres.

“I probably helped pick ‘em then,” Floyd said.

The next stage for the teen-aged Floyd was to work at the P.J. Taggares potato packing warehouse in Prosser. He did just about everything there.

“Potatoes came in half-filled sacks,” Floyd said. “We dumped them from those flatbed trucks onto the conveyor belt. Then I was a jigger and a sewer. A jigger filled sacks and set them on the scale at exactly 102 pounds, and sewers closed the sacks. My brother and I switched off as jigger and sewer. In those days we worked together all of the time.”

Even after the brothers stopped working together, Charles Floyd remained in the same industry. He had his own potato operation in Quincy, where the family landed in the 1950s.

Floyd was a senior in high school when his father moved the family there. He played some football that year, but mostly he worked — afternoons, evenings, weekends — at a potato packing shed built by his father.

“We all worked in those days,” he said.

After graduation, Floyd went off to Washington State University. But he completed only one semester. A hardship forced him to return to work. His father had bought, packed and shipped 80 tons of potatoes that went bad in transport.

“We had committed to buying them, and so we paid the farmers off. When we did, the warehouse was gone. There was no money for school,” Floyd said.

The 19-year-old Floyd returned to Quincy and, along with his father, went to work for Quincy potato packer Arch Russell. He was a mechanic and worked at the front end of the sorter. He also worked for Quincy farmer Bob Darwood, doing whatever was needed. He married Janet Humes, of Ephrata.

“She married a day worker. She had lots of guts,” Floyd said.

The Floyds raised three children. Their daughter Susan Egbert is a nurse in Othello. Son Tim works for Seattle-Tacoma Box in Spokane. Son Patrick is operations manager at Harvest Fresh. The Floyds have seven grandchildren, one great-grandchild and “one on the way.”

After marrying, Floyd joined the Army National Guard and served for seven years. The first six months for Floyd were active duty, after which he moved to Poulsbo to manage a hardware store and the produce division of a grocery store. Later he managed a bowling alley in Bremerton, and then he worked on the construction of a dry dock for aircraft carriers at the Bremerton Naval Shipyard.

Finally, Floyd came back to Othello in 1962, but not for potatoes. His father offered to partner with him in the Othello Bowl, which was up for sale.

“It was time,” Floyd said. “I was missing the sunshine.”

Then hardship struck again. Within months, Floyd’s father, who was working at a P.J. Taggares warehouse, fell from a Hyster and broke his back. Floyd took over for his father and eventually sold the bowling alley.

“Potatoes is what I knew best,” he said.

Taggares left fresh packing 1965 to concentrate on processing, and Floyd was transferred to Chef Reddy in Othello as the raw products (potato) inspector. Then he went inside the French fry plant as night shift supervisor.

In 1972, Floyd went back to fresh potatoes and partnered with Tony Palmiero and Wayne Mills, buying one-third of Harvest Fresh Inc. He ran the packing shed, Palmiero ran the farm, and Mills ran the office. Later Palmiero bought Floyd’s third, and then in 1986 Floyd and four partners bought Harvest Fresh from Palmiero, and Floyd became the manager for the entire operation.

Floyd started to grow potatoes on a limited basis (125 acres) in 1984. In 1986, he farmed 1,200 acres along with his Harvest Fresh partners Mike Eldridge, Dave Long, Dick Kohn, and Jerry Furman under the company name of HF Farms.

He was still farming 1,000 acres last year, 70 years after shaking those first vines in the Ellensburg Valley.

In his semi-retirement, Floyd will no longer farm potatoes, but he will continue to work at Harvest Fresh maybe another four or five years.

“I’m the kind of guy who will never completely quit,” he said. “I need something to do, something to keep my mind busy.”