Greg Reece sets out samples of Mr. G's Kettle Corn during an event featuring Kentucky Proud products sold at the store Wednesday, Oct. 19, 2016 at the Houchens Priceless IGA store on Russellville Road. (Miranda Pederson/photo@bgdailynews.com)

Forty-two Houchens Industries-owned grocery stores will offer Kentucky Proud products, state Ag Commissioner Ryan Quarles said Wednesday.

Quarles stood in the recently renovated Houchens Priceless IGA store on Russellville Road, surrounded by producers, state lawmakers, friends of Kentucky Proud, and a kiosk filled with Kentucky-made food items.

He calls the rollout the “most comprehensive” in the state program’s history.

“This is the premier marketing program in Kentucky,” Quarles said. “We have a historic relationship with Houchens.”

Roger Snell, farm to retail liaison with Kentucky Proud, who said he’s been with the program before it had a name, noted it has grown from one farm — one item at a time — to $500 million in retail store sales annually. That doesn’t include revenue from sales at farmers markets and other outlets.

Snell said the “secret weapon” that Kentucky Proud has that other states don’t have is the tobacco settlement money managed by the state Agriculture Development Board.

“This started out as an alternative (market strategy) to tobacco,” Snell said. 

The Kentucky Proud presence in Houchens will be up from the current eight grocery stores, said Brandon Jones, Houchens Industries marketing coordinator. Those stores currently include the new Price Less IGA store in Bowling Green, three IGA stores in Owensboro, three IGA stores in Glasgow, and Crossroads IGA in Louisville.

Louisville distributor Fishmarket Inc. helps bring producers into the Kentucky Proud program.

Brad Smith, co-owner of Fishmarket Inc., said his company vets the potential farmer-producers.

“The tobacco money takes it completely to a new level,” said Smith, who is co-owner with his identical twin brother, Stephen. 

Stephen Smith and their Dad, Jere, started what is generally known as Fishmarket Seafood in 1988, after years in the grocery business.

“The funding enables us to coordinate sourcing, production, training and education,” Brad Smith said.

Curtis Simpson and Ben Spicer of McLean County, who run Ranger Bees Honey in Beech Grove, about an hour and a half drive from Bowling Green, said putting their honey on all those Houchens Industries shelves is an answered prayer.

“We give all the glory to God. He has blessed our business,” Spicer said.

Spicer said the honey business was started about three years ago with a couple of bee hives and now has grown to more than 150 hives at peak season this year.

Ranger Bees Honey could grow to a couple thousand hives, Spicer said.

This is the first year Ranger Bees Honey appears in retail grocery stores in Kentucky, Simpson said. 

While the operation has not had to deal with the bee deaths that have plagued America in recent years, Simpson said they have been battling queen bee failures.

Simpson said Kentucky’s Master Beekeeper Kent Williams has been their mentor and helped them with this new phase in their business.

State Rep. Wilson Stone, D-Scottsville, said Kentucky Proud is a great program.

“It has been a singular success. And, it’s best days are yet to come.”

State Rep Michael Meredith, R-Brownsville, said people need to understand that small farm operations creating speciality products make a significant impact to Kentucky’s agriculture.

Products at the Price Less IGA for customers to sample included Ranger Bees Honey; Catrina’s Kitchen; Bourbon Barrel Foods; Mr. G’s Kettle Corn of Louisville and KHI Foods of Burlington.

Jones said Houchens Industries, founded in 1917 in rural Barren County and today with nearly 18,000 employee owners, understands that consumers want Kentucky food products.

“It means something to you when you know that someone down the street made that.”

— For more information on Kentucky Proud, go to http://www.kyproud.com/

— Follow business reporter Charles A. Mason on Twitter @BGDNbusiness or visit bgdailynews.com.