Family grows more than 2,000 acres of sweet corn, watermelon and cantaloupe
WEBBERS FALLS, OKLA. – Bill Shelby had some long nights growing up. As soon as he was old enough, he found himself sitting on the side of the road with his cousins hocking his family’s sweet corn to passing motorists in Webbers Falls, Okla.
“What we did with the sweet corn growing up is we would sell it on the side of the road. People would laugh and say that we couldn’t give it away,” Bill said. “When me and my cousins turned 16, we would all basically go find a different spot and go sell it somewhere else across the state. I used to take it to Enid, sleep in a Walmart parking lot, wake up, sell my corn and go home, get another load and come back. And that would provide me money for college and things like that.”
A few decades later, Bill and his family are still selling their sweet corn in much the same manner, but in much larger volumes for Shelby & Ross Produce. They went from people believing they couldn’t give it away to selling out every season.
“In the beginning, we just didn’t have the market and the varieties improved a lot where it got a lot sweeter than it was back then,” Bill said. “Now people kind of go crazy for the yellow and white sweet corn, the bi-colored sweet corn that we have today. We’ll sell 100 acres in about three weeks. There might be nights when we sell almost all of it wholesale. We sell it in Webbers Falls every day that we harvest. My nephew sells it in Webbers Falls. My wife (Cristin) and I take it to the Tulsa Farmer’s Market every week that we have it. My brother goes to Broken Arrow Farmer’s Market. A guy who works for us goes to the Fort Smith Farmer’s Market, and my other brother and his family go to Edmond and Norman Farmer’s markets with it. But we may load up 30 or 40 different customers in a given night with Sweet Corn to go sell all over the state.
“It goes all the way to Branson, Mo., all the way to western Oklahoma in the Clinton area and everywhere in between,” Shelby continued. “And it’s all just people selling on the side of the road.”
Along with working at a bank, Bill is now co-owner of Shelby & Ross Produce with his uncle, Bob Ross. With more than 2,000 acres of sweet corn, watermelon and cantaloupe, he says the busiest time of the year is during the summer when everything comes into harvest.
“We sell sweet corn for usually about three weeks, starting in late June and going to about July 15 or so,” Bill said. “That’s probably what we’re most well known for. We also, the watermelons kick up usually late July and go until about Labor Day.
The original plot of land that Shelby & Ross sits on dates back to before Oklahoma was even a state.
“The land was allotted to my great, great grandpa on the Cherokee allotment,” Bill said. “Because of being Cherokee citizens, they were allotted 40 acres, I think pre-statehood. He was actually in the womb of his mom at the time. He wasn’t even born yet.”
It was Bill’s grandfather, Robert Ross, who began to farm the land and grow sweet corn along with soybeans and wheat in Webbers Falls.
“I grew up doing this with my family. My dad and my uncle did it back then. Just kind of smaller quantities, like smaller acreage. That kind of helped me come back to join the farm and we increased our volume ,” Bill said. “We had always grown a little produce, but we started growing more produce and started supplying Reasors over here in eastern Oklahoma, a grocery store chain.
“My dad had been selling them watermelons and we started selling them watermelons, sweet corn, pumpkins and some other things. Today we don’t sell to those guys, but we grow quite a bit of it and sell to just local mom-and-pop type places. Lots of FFAs ball teams, people doing fundraisers.”
Shelby & Ross Produce keeps growing and attracting more customers each year.
“There’s been a desire for people to know where their food comes from for the local small supply chains,” Bill said. “We saw a need there 15, 20 years ago when we started trying to sell more, and it’s just kind of taken advantage of it, and it’s worked really well. We’re not necessarily the cheapest, but we try to give them a good product that tastes good. We try to grow varieties that we think tastes good, look good, and that the people enjoy and it tastes different than what’s in the grocery store.”
With the help of social media, Bill has plans to continue growing the business with his family.
“My kids go with us to the farmer’s market,” Bill said. “I hope to transition it to the next generation at some point as well to keep going so that they could have those same opportunities. I would love to see it keep growing, produce more, grow more, and expand the brand.”
